The show played to a capacity crowd of 3 to 4 thousand people. The band was tight and they were obviously having fun, although neither Entwistle nor Parsons emit much emotion one way or another. The 3 Todd songs in the first set were all on the money...Open My Eyes was searing, Hello It's Me was played straight with very little goofing by Todd, and Bang the Drum was god-damned kick-ass, if you can believe that. All the set one tunes were spot on except for Entwistle's "My Wife" which suffered because of weak vocals by John.
Set 2 brought the freakin' house down. There was no doubt which was the stronger of the 2 sets tonight. The Beatles set was far better received than that of the artists original music.
The show tonight was nothing like what BAD described as to what he witnessed. This was not a Todd Rundgren show with supporting players. Todd, unfortunately, does not play that much lead guitar. In fact he played the least lead of any of the guitarists. David Pack of Ambrosia, who was excellent by the way, and Simon Townsend handled the majority of the lead work. For me, Todd's shining moment was While My Guitar gently weeps. It's the kind of shit I live for when I go to see Todd wail, and on that tune he blistered! Todd did his usual amounts of mugging, but nothing out of the ordinary. He actually just blended in to a very good band tonight.
Anne Wilson was awesome. Hands down the best vocalist on stage tonight. As I mentioned, David Pack was not only very strong instrumentally, but sang his ass off as well.
Backstage after the show, all the musicians came out and spoke with us and they were very genuine. Todd was in good spirits and very chatty. It was a blast to talk with Anne Wilson about the Brian Wilson tribute show she and her sister took part in. She said it was a very emotional experience and a lot of the performers were crying backstage because the music was so beautiful. She got a thrill out of meeting Paul Simon for the first time. David pack said he was in awe of working with the likes of Todd and John Entwistle.
Obviously a lot can be said for what this band is, a very high-priced Beatles cover band. But at the same time, they do it better than anyone you'll ever see or hear. The thrill of the music and the performance, was only out-shined by the genuine joy that the crowd was experiencing. I had a blast watching everybody having FUN. Is it wrong.....? Jesus, what's wrong with having fun? So what if Todd's playing old music? So what if most of the old music Todd's playing isn't even his? SO FREAKING WHAT? I'm telling you in a corny kind of way, it was good for the heart to see thousands and thousands of people experiencing pure elation. Hey, if you're looking for a good time, and you wanna hear good music, go see this show. You'll have fun, and that should be the bottom line.
