Train Makes 25 Years of Drops of Jupiter Feel Like a Reunion at the Greek Theatre

An anniversary tour can become a museum if an artist lets it. Train did the opposite at the Greek Theatre.

The Aug. 24 Los Angeles stop of the Drops of Jupiter: 25 Years in the Atmosphere Tour was technically built around the band’s 2001 breakthrough, but the night never really behaved like an album anniversary show. Barenaked Ladies and Matt Nathanson joined the summer run, and by the time Train took the stage, the concert already felt less like a retrospective and more like a gathering of musicians who had decided to keep wandering into one another’s sets.

Even Train’s own set resisted the obvious route. They did not play Drops of Jupiter front to back. In fact, only three songs from the album made the Los Angeles set: “She’s on Fire,” “Mississippi” and the title track. Instead, the 19-song show moved across nearly three decades, beginning with “She’s on Fire” before jumping through “50 Ways to Say Goodbye,” “If It’s Love,” “AM Gold” and “Play That Song.”

That was probably the smarter way to celebrate 25 years. Train’s relationship with nostalgia is a little unusual because several different eras of the band have songs big enough to define them. For one part of the audience, that is “Drops of Jupiter.” For another, it is “Hey, Soul Sister.” Someone else probably arrived waiting for “Drive By.” Treating the anniversary as an excuse to move through all of those versions of Train made the show feel much less predictable.

There was also a new Train sitting right beside the old one.

Midway through the opening stretch came “To Gloria,” the first track on Mad Dog in the Fog, Train’s 12th studio album. The album arrived four days after the Greek Theatre show on Aug. 28 and marked the band’s first studio record since AM Gold in 2022. Its title reaches even further backward than Drops of Jupiter: it takes its name from the San Francisco pub where Train played one of its early paid gigs.

That combination of looking backward while actively making something new became the most interesting part of the night.

The guest appearances helped. Matt Nathanson returned during Train’s set for a cover of John Mellencamp’s “Jack & Diane.” Barenaked Ladies’ Ed Robertson came back out for “Meet Virginia,” which folded into “Take Me Home, Country Roads.” Later, Emma Busse joined Train for the live debut of “Song I Used to Know.”

That last appearance was more than a random duet. Busse stars as Gretta in the upcoming stage adaptation of Begin Again, which features music and lyrics by Pat Monahan and Train and begins its world-premiere pre-Broadway run at San Diego’s Old Globe on Sept. 6. “Song I Used to Know” is part of that project, meaning the Greek Theatre audience got an early glimpse at another direction the band’s music is moving outside of its own albums.

For all the people coming and going, some of the strongest moments were the ones that stripped the stage back down.

“Marry Me” gave the night one of its quieter stretches before the set quickly rebuilt itself through “Save Me, San Francisco” and “Bruises.” That shift is part of what Train still does well live. The songs can be unapologetically sentimental, and Monahan rarely seems interested in distancing himself from that. There is no wink attached to “Marry Me” or “Drops of Jupiter.” They work because the band commits to them as completely as it does to the brighter pop songs.

Then the show became slightly ridiculous again.

Ken Jeong appeared during “Hey, Soul Sister,” turning one of Train’s biggest songs into something closer to an onstage party, while the later stretch included the Dirty Heads’ “Vacation” and “Drive By,” the latter expanding into a “Hey Jude” outro. The Los Angeles set also featured Monahan’s son Rock during a cover of Journey’s “Stone in Love.”

It could have easily become messy. Instead, the constant guests made sense for a tour centered on longevity. Twenty-five years after Drops of Jupiter, Train was not presenting its career as a sealed-off piece of history. The people who opened the show came back. Family showed up. A song from a musical that had not even opened yet entered the set. New album material sat between songs that have been on radio for decades.

And eventually, of course, everything had to lead back to “Drops of Jupiter.”

Train saved it for last.

There was no real need to manufacture a dramatic encore around it. The title track has spent 25 years becoming the sort of song where the opening moments already tell an audience exactly where the night is going. At the Greek Theatre, it worked less as a nostalgia exercise than as the point where all of the different versions of Train finally met.

The band came to Los Angeles celebrating the record that changed its career. Four days later, it would release another one. A few weeks after that, Train’s music would move onto a theatre stage in San Diego.

For a 25th-anniversary tour, that feels like the more interesting story.

Train is still looking back. It just has not stopped moving forward.