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It was indeed One Wild Night! Phoenix, 4/18/01Apr 19 '01 Write an essay on this topic.
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The Bottom Line With great energy onstage, a good mix of old and new songs,and superb playing, this concert is definitely worth the ticket price.
The last time I saw Bon Jovi live was in 1987, and it seems as though no time has passed for this band. They haven't aged! And they can surely still rock hard. They also enjoy what they are doing, immensely, if tonight's concert was any indication. The first few songs were broadcast on VH1, and it was the first night of the tour, so the Blockbuster Desert Sky Pavilion was packed to the top of the lawn with screaming fans (ok, myself included). I am always under the impression that lawn seats never sell out, so my friend and I went to the venue expecting to buy tickets at the box office. We lucked out, though, and were given a pair of complimentary lawn seats as we were waiting in line (I suppose he had won them, and had decided to buy better seats). Yay! We were in for free, so that meant we could each buy a t-shirt. They have a large selection of tour shirts, all $30 or higher. Unbelievable! I remember when shirts were $15, and tickets the same price. Ah, for the good ol' eighties. The intro to the concert was fun - the set looked like a rooftop scene, with vents and bricks and chimneys. The boys were broadcast onto large screens, watching a VH1 introduction, then getting up and going into an elevator, which exited onto the stage. The first three songs, for the VH1 broadcast, were One Wild Night, You Give Love a Bad Name, and It's My Life. Lots of audience participation on those songs. Next up was Livin' on a Prayer, in which Jon flubbed a verse. Instead of "Gina works the diner all day", he put the second verse in ("Gina dreams of running away..), and then when the second verse came around, he repeated the same line. Oops! Next was Captain Crash & the Beauty Queen From Mars, a quirky song from their current album Crush. After that Jon made a comment that they were going to be playing some different songs, ones they hadn't done live in a long time, and so they played Born to Be My Baby, and Wild in the Streets. At some point during the VH1 part of the show, some fans were allowed up on stage, about 10-15 on each side, behind a waist-high wrought iron barrier (I suppose to be reminiscent of balconies overlooking the rooftop scene). During Wild in the Streets, John invited one of those girls outside the barrier to dance with him, and she ended up jumping into his arms, with her legs around his waist. Whoo! Talk about sass! Jon thought it was hysterical. The next songs were Older, Wild is the Wind, and an extended, audience sing-along version of I'll Be There for You. After that they went into a long rendition of Lay Your Hands on Me, during which Jon again ventured to the fan sides of the stage, and was groped so often and in such personal places that he almost stopped singing since he was laughing so hard. When he got back to the center of the stage, he said "I'm scared!", and Richie said "You should be scared!" Jon then said "Ok, we have been gone for far too long. You have had all these boy bands to contend with, you need a MAN band." This was accompanied by a nice flexed-arm-muscle pose, which was extremely appreciated by the women in the crowd (ok, I was screaming too). They continued their eclectic set with I'll Sleep When I'm Dead, Runaway, and Someday I'll Be Saturday Night. Somewhere around that song Jon got very introspective and went off on a story for about 3-4 minutes. The main thing I got from it was this: When he and Richie were writing all these songs over the years, they were writing them for them. But he said "I realize that we were writing them for you." Much appreciative screaming from the crowd, and then they launched into Bad Medicine. They ended their set with a short version of "Shout" (NOT the Tears for Fears version, the other one). Short intermission, with the requisite screaming, whistling, and banging of pavilion chairs, and then they came out to play Something to Believe In. On a funny note, if you decide to go to this show further on in the tour, and they play this song, you can be witty and participate like the girls behind us. Jon had the audience echoing the "Hey hey hey hey" part of this song, but the happy (read: drunk) girls behind us decided to change the echo to "F*%k f*%k f*%k me". Ha ha, how clever. The ended Encore #1 with Faith, went offstage for a couple more minutes, and then came back with the song I was waiting for, Wanted Dead or Alive. And it was worth the wait, this song is still powerful and was beautifully played. Richie in his black brimmed hat, with the double-necked guitar, ahhh. Gets me every time. And they should have ended it there, it would have been perfect. But they decided to come out one more time, and played a rockin' version of Tequila, followed by a ten-minute-long Twist and Shout that I thought wasn't ever going to end. They were having way too much fun up there, it was very obvious that they were happy to be back on stage, but I would rather have heard a couple more of their own songs earlier in the set. Overall, though, the concert was great, an excellent mix of their old and new songs, so it should appeal to their older fans as well as the newer ones.  |
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