The Dave Matthews Band kicked off their summer tour— their first full tour since 2010—at the Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion in The Woodlands May 18. As is typical with most Dave Matthews Band shows at the Pavilion, the 20th in their career, the show was sold out. In fact, Matthews mentioned during the set that the crowd was the largest to ever see the band play at the Pavilion. The Pavilion confirmed an all-time Dave Matthews Band high of tickets sold at 16,623.

As is also typical with a Dave Matthews Band show, the audience never quite knows what it will get. The band is famous for mixing up its setlist from night to night and with the expectation of a new album in the fall, all bets were off as to what the band would play.

The setlist focused primarily on material from the mid to later portions of their career such as opener "Big Eyed Fish," "Grace is Gone," and rare gem "You Never Know" from 2002's "Busted Stuff." A few songs from 2009's Grammy-nominated "Big Whiskey and the Groogrux King" also was performed, such as "Funny The Way It Is," "Seven" and "Squirm," which was the encore opener.

Dave Matthews Band debuted three new songs during the set, including "Gaucho," "Mercy," and "Sweet," and sprinkled in a few songs that have not been featured on full albums but remain popular live staples such as "Beachball" and "Eh Hee."

The first half of the show lacked the energy and tempo the band is known for and the three new songs created a lull in the crowd's energy. But tunes such as "You and Me," "Crush" and "Rapunzel" were crowd pleasers later in the show.

Conspicuously missing from the setlist were many of their crowd-pleasing live staples, such as "Ants Marching," "Two Step," "Crash Into Me" and "Satellite." The omissions left plenty of people grumbling as they left the venue.

The show had a feeling of catering to the hard-core fan, which in the case of Dave Matthews Band, certainly represents a sizable chunk of the audience as with most bands with a career of 20 years or more. But a bone or two thrown to the casual fan would have been a welcome addition to the evening.