[67blackcherry]

Yup - last night of rehearsals, "friends and family" show - maybe a few thousand people there, the floor of The Forum wasn't even full, and the band KICKED ASS.

Set list
You Really Got Me
Running with the Devil
She's the Woman (new tune)
Somebody Get Me A Doctor
Tattoo (new tune)
Everybody Wants Some
Beautiful Girls
Ice Cream Man
Chinatown (new tune)
Dance the Night Away
Hot For Teacher
Blood and Fire (new tune)
Eruption
Panama
Jump

Kool and the Gang was great - Van Halen was awesome (not quite as good as the Fair Warning / Diver Down / 1984 tours I saw but still....) and Wolfie did a fine job.

Nothing off Fair Warning or Diver Down.....bummer.

The band seemed to be really focusing on staying in the groove; tempos were (I thought) slow at first but then it was just....."ok, got it, you guys are just laying down a groove".....Alex sounded great, he was right in the pocket all night - Wolfie's playing was great, Dave sounded fine....he missed a few notes but that's par for the course for him, he never was Freddie Mercury or anyone like that. Very entertaining, he had a huge smile on his face all night too.

Ed's playing......I would say he's playing a just a bit bluesier these days. He's not really doing any of the wide intervalic stretches and weird chromatic end of the world "I'm Eddie Van Halen and I rewrote the book" type of stuff like the solo on "Girl Gone Bad" yet he still has that awesome sense of melody. His tone - big and thick, he used the wah sparingly all night - it sounded great. Was Eruption on par with the 14+ minute solo on the Largo MD Diver Down dvd? IMO, no. Was it substandard like it has been in recent years? Absolutely not. He looked good, he's put on some weight, he didn't blow a fhag all night long (maybe he quit?) there was chemistry between Dave and himself - he looked like he was having an absolute blast up there, big smile all night long.

Kool and the Gang - very risky but a great choice. Celebrate (Good Times), Jungle Boogie, Ladies Night, Get Down On It, etc etc....I'm 48, the audience was for the most part my age - some older, some younger - and everyone was digging it. There was a lot of energy, folks were dancing and having a good time, they were singing along..... the band did just fine.

Buy the cd and catch the tour, you won't be disappointed.



And oh how I wish I had upgraded to an iPhone.....my crackberry sucks! There's a lot of footage on YouTube - check it out!