... so we are all happy now. :D I go to bed now, good night everyone. :)
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... so we are all happy now. :D I go to bed now, good night everyone. :)
Goodnight Michaela, sweet Keith dreams :D
:twisted: :twisted: :twisted: :D
Nighty night! That was fun! :D
Today I found an awesome review of one of his recent shows. Seems he's going to get a worthy successor for the Eagles. Of course no one would ever replace our band. :wink:
Who will be the next batch of classic rock acts to fill arenas, amphitheaters and even stadiums in the decades to come after the Rolling Stones, the Eagles and Jimmy Buffett finally call it quits?
Don’t look to the pop music world for answers. Instead _ as odd as it may initially sound _ the next crop is far more likely to come from the so-called “new country” genre.
The transition is already happening. Kenny Chesney has fashioned himself in Buffett’s mold. Rascal Flatts has charted an Eagles course. Toby Keith has sunk some Cougar-like claws into John Mellencamp territory.
And then there is Keith Urban, the platinum-selling cowboy who performs on Friday at the HP Pavilion in San Jose. More than any other current country act, the 39-year-old New Zealander is greedily borrowing from the Stones and other golden sources to fashion a lengthy, classic rock-style career.
Granted, Urban doesn’t technically play rock ‘n’ roll. But what he does play _ as well as what Chesney, Big & Rich and many others of their ilk perform _ sure sounds a lot more like classic rock than what most young pop bands churn out.
That definitely was the case during Urban’s concert on Tuesday night at Arco Arena in Sacramento. The things that separated Urban’s performance from what commonly goes down at an arena rock show could’ve been fit into one mighty small Stetson hat _ that is, if you could’ve found a Stetson, since there were no cowboy hats onstage and few to be seen in the audience.
Following an opening set by the Wreckers _ the fine band led by the vocal duo of Michelle Branch and Jessica Harp _ Urban and his five-piece crew kicked off the main event with a rousing rendition of “Once in a Lifetime.”
A few minutes into that tune _ which also opens the singer’s latest CD, last year’s “Love, Pain and the Whole Crazy Thing” _ the group ventured into a space that was far more Motley Crue than Merle Haggard. The musicians even looked the part, with the shaggy-haired bandleader bending over and wailing away on his electric guitar in front of a bald Billy Corgan-look-alike coolly plucking bass.
But it’s not just the look and the sound that conjures up thoughts of acts like the Stones. Equally important, it’s all the other things that Urban does that seem so very much in line with the current classic rock crew. Of course, he’s married to a movie star (Nicole Kidman, who did not make it out to Sacramento) and recently went to rehab (a three-month stint at the Betty Ford Center) _ both of which help his rock cred.
He also embraces showmanship and spectacle in his live show. He doesn’t just play Lynyrd Skynyrd-worthy guitar solos _ he plays them with gusto, dropping to one knee to emphasis a particularly poignant note or taking a well-timed break to slap hands with crowd members. Even his stage setup, which featured a long catwalk that connected the main stage to a smaller one in the back of the arena, seemed straight from a Rolling Stones’ past-tours garage sale.
Urban, who has only been a star of note since 2000, paces his show like a 30-year veteran of the touring business. He mixes the right amount of fast numbers (such as “Where the Blacktop Ends” from 1999’s “Keith Urban”) with the proper dose of romantic ballads (like the new album’s “I Can’t Stop Loving You”).
He also provides enough changes _ moving to a solo acoustic setting for an intimate “Raining on Sunday” from 2002’s `Golden Road,” carrying out a campfire-style sing-along from the secondary stage on the same album’s “You’ll Think of Me” _ to keep things intriguing.
The twists and turns come naturally, and always appropriately, as if Urban is reading fans’ minds to find out exactly what they want to hear next as well as how they want to hear it. Fans experience the same thing when they go see a Bruce Springsteen or Bob Seger show.
He brought Tuesday’s main set to a close with a mix of tender love ballads that had the ladies squealing (notably “Tonight I Wanna Cry” from 2004’s “Be Here”) and rowdy numbers that had fans waving Sabbath-style devil fists in the air (especially during the “Be Here”-track “Days Go By”).
As part of his encore, Urban conducted the crowd in what he dubbed a cell phone wave. That was a new one on this concert critic _ watching thousands of fans carry out a sports-style wave while holding their lit phones in an otherwise dark arena. At the end of which, Urban smiled broadly and playfully announced:
“Lighting brought to you by Nokia.”
And with that, Urban had hit upon the final ingredient for lasting success in the classic rock realm: Corporate sponsorship.
Wow! Great review! I felt like I was there! :rockguitar:
Thanks EF! :D
That was an awesome review! :D
I was reading somewhere else last week that him and his band did a short attempt at "Boys of Summer" during a recent show.
So how many Eagles or Eagles related songs is that for him?
He's done Take it to the Limit, Dirty Laundry, and now Boys of Summer so far?
...not to forget Heart Of The Matter. :D He's done Dirty Laundry? I didn't know that.Quote:
Originally Posted by Maleah
I've read a lot of reviews the last days and all were fantastic reads. People seem to love him so much. The songs, the performance as well as his guitar playing. I find it very cool that they have catwalks in the arena so people who have bad seats could see him too.
I'm sooooooo glad I get to see him again this year. :D :D
whooooooops :D I meant to say HOTM but I was listening to DL when I posted that :lol: :lol: :lol:Quote:
Originally Posted by EasyFeeling
:blush:
Remember the rock writer Bob Lefsetz, who loves the Eagles and Don? I subscribe to his emails, and he loves Keith too. He wrote a lengthy review about how much he enjoyed his show at the Staples Center, and here is one quote from it that made me laugh:
"Keith picked up a poster that said the holder would let him kiss his wife if Keith would let him kiss his, and then, after laughing, Keith ran into the audience and kissed the guy's significant other. And upon returning to his stool, Keith leaned into the mic and said GOOD LUCK EXECUTING YOUR PART OF THE DEAL!"
:lol: