I caught prog rock super dudes Asia here in Cleveland at the House of Blues on Friday night.  My proper review of the show can be found here, but I also took time to jot down a few sarcastic thoughts regarding the interesting people watching opportunities (as well as random band-related thoughts) that were all around me.

• As a member of the cult of prog, please note that it is an unspoken requirement that you must wear a t-shirt of your favorite prog band when going to see another prog band play a show. Since this is an Asia show, it is completely acceptable to wear Yes, Rush and Porcupine Tree t-shirts to show the others in attendance that you are legitimately prog. Remember, wearing an Asia shirt if you're going to see Asia violates that other unspoken rule. (Additional concert t-shirt tips can be found here.)
• There are girls here at this show, but I'm not quite sure how they got here. Many of them are stuck on dates that they will never forget, and not for good sentimental reasons. Some are in attendance as the supportive wife/girlfriend and surprisingly, there are quite a few here that are visibly big Asia fans. Is it a Wetton thing? Or perhaps it's something along the lines of "that Geoff Downes guy is so dreamy." You tell me.
• The tribe is cheering as Palmer raises a mallet high into the air to signify that there will be gong-age on "Time Again."
• I know I said this earlier in the review, but Steve Howe shouldn't be able to play guitar like that. Massive amounts of geeking out during his acoustic guitar solo portion of the show. And during "An Extraordinary Life," why play one guitar when you can play two guitars instead? You're welcome, disciples.
• "The Heat Goes On" brings the expected drum solo from Carl Palmer. I feel sympathy for guys like Carl Palmer, because drumming is a very physical activity and yet you're expected to bring it every night on that solo, just like you did back in 1973. So it's no surprise that at the end of the song, Palmer springs from behind the kit and does a victory lap out to the microphone. You'd better believe that he earned that lap and subsequent riotous standing ovation from the ever-adoring audience. Actually, most of us are already standing, so does that still count as a standing ovation? Sure.
• During "Days Like These," I observe a shocking moment where Geoff Downes actually has time to step away from the keyboards and he makes good use of the time, playfully mugging with the crowd. Up until this point of the show, all hands have been on deck with Downes manning at least one keyboard at all times.

Here's the evening's setlist:

I Believe
Only Time Will Tell
Holy War
Never Again
Through My Veins
Don't Cry (John and Geoff solo with crowd singalong portion)
Steve Howe solo
The Smile Has Left Your Eyes (John and Geoff solo with electric full band reprise at the end)
Open Your Eyes
Go
Time Again
An Extraordinary Life
End of the World
The Heat Goes On (w/ Palmer drum solo)
Sole Survivor

encore:

Days Like These
Heat Of The Moment

Photos of Delorean and Raekwon at the 2010 Pitchfork Music Festival by Amy Weiser.

Photos of Wolf Parade and LCD Soundsystem at the 2010 Pitchfork Music Festival by Amy Weiser.

Inspired by Shakespeare's title, indie rockers Titus Andronicus had the thought that "Titus Andronicus" would make for a great band name.  It's certainly an inspired choice (and just when you thought the world was starting to run out of unique band names).

Photos from the 2010 Pitchfork Music Festival, taken by Amy Weiser.

But instead, we got a full three hours of both hits and rarities, and for the know-it-alls like me that were in attendance, McCartney even had a very cool story about Jimi Hendrix.  After tacking on a bit of "Foxy Lady" to the end of "Let Me Roll It," McCartney shared a vivid recollection about releasing the Sgt. Pepper album on a Friday, and seeing Jimi open his set with the title track later that same weekend.

Jokingly titled as the "Up and Coming" tour, the current setlist might be one of the best that I've seen since McCartney made his return to the road in 1989.  There were so many highlights scattered among the expected setlist inclusions - the opening reprise of "Venus and Mars/Rock Show" into "Jet" (a track sequencing flashback for all who own a copy of the Wings over America live album) burned to the point that it almost felt like 1976 again.  A nice four song stint found McCartney behind the piano for "Nineteen Hundred and Eighty-Five," a nice surprise and relative rarity from Band on the Run that was introduced as "one for the Wings fans," while "Let 'Em In" was equally pleasing,  clanking along faithfully to the recorded version, even replicating the false fade out ending of the original, before quickly smashing to a close as the band came back in.

Of the newer material that is in the current setlist, "Dance Tonight" remains one of my favorites, and it continues to suggest to me that perhaps I should give 2007's Memory Almost Full another look.  With McCartney strumming away on a ukelele during the song, it's impossible to not find yourself in a good mood.  Or in a reflective mood, sitting in the way back machine as McCartney sings the classics - specifically the ones that fall into the category of "songs that he won't be able to leave the building without singing."  During "The Long and Winding Road," I had my official flashback moment, remembering many things past, including all of the hours and days that I spent as a kid, listening to my Dad's Beatles albums and discovering my love of music for the first time.  Looking around the crowd during these songs, you could see many having their own time of reflection, while simultaneously sharing the experience and joy of seeing the Paul McCartney with their kids (and those kids might have looked occasionally bored, but they're kids, after all).

McCartney's band really have gelled as a unit since the first time that I saw them in 2002.  It's nice to have  Paul "Wix" Wickens (a veteran of McCartney tours in the early '90s) back in the fold on keyboards providing a bit of a link between the old and the new.  Abe Laboriel, Jr. is one of those drummers who is large enough that you'd question his ability to get it done behind the kit, but he quickly proves you wrong with his prowess on the skins, doubling as McCartney's partner in comic relief (while ultimately staying on task and providing a good amount of the harmony vocals).  At this point, I must also give special mention to the McCartney/Laboriel fist bump that came mid-way through the set - add that to the list of things that I thought I'd never see!  Guitarists Rusty Anderson and Brian Ray attack every guitar lick with gusto, and the enthusiasm of being on stage with a legend like Sir Paul is something you can't miss when you look at their faces.

When I saw McCartney for the first time in 1990, I wasn't sure that I'd ever see him again, and if I did, it seemed unlikely that he'd top the experience and feeling of that show.  Drawing from his incredible catalog of songs, McCartney continues to prove me wrong , still shredding his voice on familiar numbers like "Helter Skelter" and leaving it all on the stage, 20 years later.  The tickets aren't cheap, but if you've got a bit of money to throw around and you're wondering if it is worth the ticket price, it's absolutely worth the ticket price and then some.  (And if you grab the really cheap seats, you'll probably enjoy it just as much, since there are video screens on either side of the stage providing constant projection of the band throughout the night.)

Can I find my way to Pittsburgh for one of the upcoming shows in August?  Boy, I'd sure like to.

(Side note:  If you're looking for a way to replicate my concert experience from this past weekend - get yourself out to one of Paul's upcoming shows or grab a copy of Good Evening New York City.  Of the live CDs/DVDs released by McCartney in the past 20 years, Good Evening is one of the best.)

Photo of Paul McCartney and Rusty Anderson via KansasCity.Com

Setlist:

Venus and Mars/Rock Show
Jet
All My Loving
Letting Go
Drive My Car
Highway
Let Me Roll It/Foxy Lady
The Long and Winding Road
Nineteen Hundred and Eighty Five
Let 'Em In
My Love
I've Just Seen A Face
And I Love Her
Blackbird
Here Today
Dance Tonight
Mrs Vandebilt
Eleanor Rigby
Something
Sing the Changes
Band on the Run
Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da
Back in the U.S.S.R.
I've Got a Feeling
Paperback Writer
A Day In the Life/Give Peace a Chance
Let It Be
Live and Let Die
Hey Jude

Encore one:
Day Tripper
Lady Madonna
Get Back

Encore Two:
Yesterday
Helter Skelter
Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (Reprise) / The End

As the week came to a close, the girlfriend got an unexpected pair of tickets to see Paul McCartney's first performance in Kansas City in 17 years.  Which means that I had to make the very difficult choice to hop on a Greyhound bus to go see the show with her.

Actually, it wasn't that hard for me, which is why at the very moment you are reading this, I'm sitting on Greyhound, bound for glory in KC on Saturday night with Sir Paul!

I can't wait - the setlist is glorious (isn't it always?), and personally, I'll be loving the opportunity to see "Venus and Mars/Rock Show" and a selection of other Macca favorites, in the flesh.  And I'll agree with my buddy Ethan - Macca has to pull out this one as long as he's hanging out in Kansas City.  My Popdose comrade Michael Fortes clued me into the fact that McCartney recently performed "San Francisco Bay Blues" to properly register his presence in the city by the Bay.

Has he ever performed that outside of Unplugged?

This will be McCartney show #4 for me, following the 1990 show at Cleveland Municipal Stadium, and two shows at Gund Arena in 2002 on the Back In The U.S. tour.  And, after seeing the Ringo show (also unexpectedly) earlier this week, I'll end the week having seen two former Beatles perform in the same week.  Former 8 year old me would be very jealous of me right now - I'll have to take some notes.

For those of you that aren't in the KC vicinity, you'll enjoy the following full length concert video from earlier this summer.

This sounds like a lot of fun to me....which means that if you're thinking that right now, you should get a move on it and purchase your tickets.  According to the Kent Stage website, there are only 5 tickets left for the show.

Worst case, you could always go and rock out with Sweet Apple tomorrow night at the Grog, or perhaps the double bill of Cheap Trick and Squeeze on Sunday night at House of Blues is the dream double bill that you've been waiting for.  In other words, there are plenty of great excuses to go see some live music this weekend.

Apparently for Jones, the answer was an easy "no," as he made the decision in 2004 to cut ties with longtime Foreigner singer Lou Gramm and move ahead with a new lineup featuring veteran singer Kelly Hansen (Hurricane) at the helm.  As a Foreigner fan, it's not my first choice to see a band called Foreigner that comes without Lou Gramm at the microphone.  But unfortunately, Lou Gramm of today is not the Lou Gramm of old, the result of side effects of brain surgery in the late '90s.  So while I admire the courage of Gramm to stand behind that microphone, it was pretty painful as a fan to watch those Foreigner shows after the surgery, because although Gramm "improved" over the course of several years, the classic voice had been forever tarnished.

As a fan of some of Kelly Hansen's past work, it was an easy endorsement for me to get behind his job placement as the new lead singer of Foreigner.  For any of the skeptics, well, if they've seen a show, there's a good chance that they're among the converted.  Foreigner are touring behind Can't Slow Down, their first new album in nearly 15 years (and a damn good one), and they're on the road this summer for a co-headlining tour creatively titled "United in Rock" with their old pals Styx (with Kansas handling opening duties).  Of course they're visiting nearly every city in America (including Cleveland at Time Warner Cable Amphitheater on June 26th!), and damn, you're going to hear a lot of hits for the price of the ticket!  I spoke with Hansen this past week for a piece that ran on the Riverfront Times music blog, prior to the band's date in St. Louis.  We talked for about a half hour, so there was a ton of material that I didn't get to use in the RFT piece, which means that you get to read the musical overspill here.  Enjoy!

From my perception, Foreigner is working more than some of the other similar bands in their genre, and to me, it seems like the band is working more today than they did back in the day.

It's quite possible. There was a very heady time at the beginning where there was a lot going on, and we are working an awful lot. It's a challenge for me vocally to make sure that I stay in shape, and it's a challenge for everybody. Through the course of the past five years, it's like a sports team – you have all sorts of injuries, you have family illness and death. You have an incredible array of things that are difficult to deal with on the road, and as they say, the show must go on. We support each other and help each other through all of these times. When I can't speak, as I didn't yesterday all day long, everybody's very understanding, and they make fun of it. They go “oh, we're going to have a great day, Kelly's not talking!” [laughs] It's really interesting, you become a family, and you deal with all the same issues of a family, while you're on the road.

That's an interesting point. I look at the Foreigner catalog as one that is similar to the Journey catalog as something that must be very challenging to sing night after night because of the high keys that so many of these songs were written in. So you would have to keep in shape vocally to be able to pull this off.

Very much so. Some people think that the fact that the set is slightly shorter because there are three bands on the bill – to accommodate three bands on the bill, everybody has to take a couple of songs out. They think it should be easier, because you're doing a shorter set. The fact of the matter is that because it's an 80 minute set that we're doing on this tour, it's very jam packed, with a lot of high energy tunes. There's not a lot of big lulls in there for me to take breaks or talk to the audience and things like that. In some ways, it's even more stressful.

I think that although you're faithful to the catalog, and the way that people expect to hear the hits, you definitely bring your own style to Foreigner.

Well, I'm just trying to be me, and not be anybody else. My feeling is that a great song with a great melody, is really easy to fuck up. If you are too much into your own self-gratification and want to impress people with how many licks you can sing, you don't want to serve the song. I think it's important to serve the song, because these are great songs. There's a reason why they've been permeating the culture for the past 30 years. I think hopefully, I'm smart enough to recognize that. So that's really all it is – it's not that hard, you try to be faithful to the songs. We all try to really listen to all of the records and understand what the Foreigner vibe is. With Mick at the helm directing that, I think we're being successful with that.

When Mick assembled that initial lineup with you, Jeff Pilson, and Jason Bonham among the list of players, it was a pretty impressive bill of folks to put under the Foreigner name.

I think that oddly enough, maybe 15 years ago vocally, I might not have been right for this band. I think that as I've matured and worked on my own singing, I think that I fit the band better. I think that my voice has gotten a richer timbre that fits this band. When grunge rolled around in '91, and no one wanted to hear my style of vocal, I spent a lot of time learning things. I thought I was really proficient as a singer technically in Hurricane, but I felt I was missing heart, I wasn't giving of myself. That's one of those things that has been hard for me to do in my whole life, is to let emotions out. I think that I've learned to do that a lot. It took a lot of practice for me to learn how to feel things, but I think along the way, it made me a better singer. Maybe it's just serendipity that this all happened at the time that it did.

I was surprised and happy to see how much writing input you had on the new album.

This was the last element of the puzzle that Mick and I hadn't tackled together. We had literally done every other thing that you can do together in this band. That's one of the things that I was simultaneously looking forward to, and worried about. When it really comes down to it, you can sing a song, travel on a bus, do early morning TV and radio – all of those kind of things. Writing material and working on a new album together with someone with the stature and success of somebody like Mick Jones is a little bit daunting. The only thing that made it easier for me is that I've spent almost five years with Mick on the road, we know each other pretty well, and he had great confidence in me. I just said that I'm not going to be worried that everyone is going to look at me and say “that's a fuckin' stupid idea, we're not going to use that.” I just allowed myself to chime in, and when those guys said no, I said okay. The next thing, maybe I said, “hey, that's a good idea.” You have to take it in and do it as it goes. Both of those guys, who are both very successful, more so than me, although I've had my modicum of success, they've done a lot more. They just welcomed me in and let me be part of the process, and I think it worked out well – I think we complimented each other very well.

I think you know that there have been guys in other bands, in a similar position like you have, that find out the hard way that their input isn't welcomed or wanted.

Right. They quite easily could have done that, but Mick has always been super supportive of me. Contrary to, without being specific, some other interviews of other singers that I've read about, he's never told me how to sing these songs, or been in control of how I present these songs – he had faith and confidence in me, and he said “this is your thing, do your thing.” It was the same thing with the writing – he felt that I needed to be there and needed to be involved as the singer of the songs, to lend my viewpoint and contribution. It wasn't like a struggle or a negotiation – he said I want you in here, writing these songs with us.

What was the process like, working in the studio with Mick?

Well, there wasn't a singular process as far as the actual conception of songs, that came from all different forms – sometimes a title, sometimes a riff, sometimes us just playing around in a circle together until something popped up, giving us an idea to work on. The recording process, both Marti [Fredriksen, co-producer of Can't Slow Down] and Mick are very strong in their opinions about what they want. Sometimes to the point where I'd say, “listen, I'm the fuckin' singer, let me try it my way first.” And they'd go, “no no no, do it this way, it's going to be great, just do it this way and we'll see how it works. If it doesn't work, we'll try something else.” So sometimes I was an instrument in their hands, as far as my voice goes. Sometimes it was something that I would do spontaneously that they never could have thought of, where they went “wow, that's really great, we gotta use that!” So it was a combo kind of pack in that way, and I didn't mind, because I know that I'm working with two guys who have good ears and good history. And if they think it should be a certain way, far be it from me to say I'm not going to fuckin' try your idea.

How did you guys connect with Marti?

Well, Mick had known Marti for a long time. They had worked on some stuff together previously with Lou, but also they wrote/produced a song for Ozzy, called “Dreamer.” They had done a lot of work [together] over the previous ten years. We really needed Marti's energy, spark, fire and determination, to get things done on time. Because as artists sometimes, we can take too long to do something or to take too long get to doing something, and Marti was right there going “come on, today we're doing it, we're going to finish this today.” (laughs) He was very forceful about it, but in a really great way and it was something that we definitely needed.

Whether it's the rock stuff on this new album, or the slower tunes, there's some really great stuff on there. I love “When It Comes To Love.”

I like “When It Comes To Love.” I've been getting reports, because now the disc with all the new material is available on Itunes, even though the triple disc set is available in Wal-Mart, and it's going to be available in another form at other outlets as well, in case you're not near a Wal-Mart. But the all-new disc is available on Itunes, and I'm starting to get the reports of the download numbers,which include the top numbers of the singles, but the very next one that's being most downloaded is called “I Can't Give Up.” I kind of think that that's probably my best vocal performance on the record, so who knows, maybe that's another single.

Those are two of my favorites, and I also love the title track, which I saw you play live in January.

We were doing “When It Comes To Love,” and we're doing “In Pieces” and “Can't Slow Down” now, just because if we add “When It Comes To Love,” that means we have to take another classic out, and that's not what we want to do. It's very difficult to make those decisions, but you have to do what you have to do. (laughs) There's a lot of tunes that we know that we can't put in the set, because we just don't have enough time. I'm very happy with the record. There are songs on there like “Angel Tonight,” which was very last minute – we didn't know if it was going to make the record. There was an element about it that wasn't working. When the record came out, I was surprised to hear a bunch of people saying how much they thought that that was their favorite song, it was very funny.

The re-recording of “Fool For You Anyway” at the end of the record is a great version of a song from the catalog that I've always loved.

I don't know if you know what the deal is with that. We did that with Mark Ronson, who is Mick Jones' stepson. Mark Ronson produced Amy Winehouse, and he's done a lot of stuff on his own. While we were working on the rest of the album in a state of the art way with Pro-Tools, and all of the modern gear, Mick and I would travel over to Brooklyn when Mark's schedule permitted, to this beat up old building with no air conditioning. It had a tiny little studio with an eight track tape machine and we went over there and recorded “Fool For You Anyway.” It was a real shock to the system, to work on those two different ends of the technological recording spectrum. Working with Mark on that really reminded me of my first days, making records on tape, waiting for the machine to rewind and it takes all day to get the sounds. It was a real trip.

On the topic of “Fool For You Anyway,” are there any other tracks for you personally that are off the beaten path in the catalog, that are tracks that you dig?

Oh, there's all kinds. We've done “Break It Up” and “That Was Yesterday.” I'd love to do “Love Has Taken It's Toll.”

Oh yeah!

You just don't have enough time in the show. I love that verse in that song – it's so great. Every once in a while, we talk about it, we work something up, we throw something in.

Did you enjoy this?  Check out the RFT portion of the interview right here.

I'm talking about Live Nation's recent announcement that they're waiving the service fees on concert ticket purchases for the entire month of June.

What does this mean for you?

This means that you've now got money for two more beers at that Tom Petty concert you're planning on attending.  It means that you can buy me two tickets to see Jackson Browne, and still have money left over to buy me that other thing that you've been thinking about.  I appreciate it.  Or perhaps you're planning to go see the Backstreet Boys - guess what?  You now have money to purchase materials to make your own costume, so that you can attend the show dressed as your favorite Backstreet Boy!

Isn't summer going to be awesome?

Click here for a list of participating artists and venues!

P.S. - I was serious about those Jackson Browne tickets.  Can we talk?