Concert review: Route Of ALl Evil Aerosmith & Motley Crue

Aerosmith & Motley Crue prove they are still: The Route To All Evil!

So this is a few days late, but with the day I’ve had since getting in to the office…I’m just going to post as many entries in la blog today as I feel fit to. See other entries to understand….(coming soon.) Anyway, on Tuesday, September 19th Ida and I went to the Jones Beach, NY concert for Motley and Aerosmith. And I was pleasantly surprised.
I was saddened about the news of Tom Hamilton’s throat cancer, but glad to hear he is on the mend. David Hull will be filling in for Tom on for the first 1-2 months of this tour. So excited as I was about seeing my favorite band and Motley…I was kind of leery of how ‘The Bad Boys of Boston’ would sound as an ‘incomplete’ unit. MY bad! Ida and I had gotten to the venue with time to kill, considering traffic and bad weather, only to be routed to another parking lot and getting on a highway, only to get kind-of lost and having to double back. By the time we were parked and at the concession stands looking at concert stuff, Crue was already on stage and I was shocked to see that not only did the gig start EXACTLY on time…but the merchandise selection was MUCH to be desired. Opting to buy a pair of undies…we headed to our seats and I had a feeling this was an omen of how the music portion of the show would be.
Motley Crue: opened the night’s show, and for some weird reason their sound system was wacked out. (Great I thought to myself…the show is going to suck.) Although Vince was singing as loud as he could, the vocals were muffled, and even some feedback. As if that wasn’t bad enough….their smoke machine was pumping overtime, so you could barely see them on stage. If it wasn’t for Tommy’s ‘Hell Yeah’s’ and ‘make some noise mutha fucka’s’ I don’t think the audience would have been at all thrilled. However by the time they launched in to ‘Kick Start My Heart’ and “Girls, Girls, Girls’ the sound was much better, and I could finally see Vince, Nikki & Mick. They had killer pyrotechnics, and were so jubilant it was clear they were having fun. They closed the set with Tommy handing off his bottle of booze to the audience for sharing. All in all their portion of the show was good…but Ida and I are actually more stoked to see Tommy Lee & the band yet to be renamed perform in January.
AEROSMITH: I don’t care what people say about the band. These guys, with Steven pushing 60 still R-O-C-K. They may have gone ‘softer’ or ‘poppy’as some people claime…but when they rock their classics such as S.O.S., Momma Kin, and ‘Sweet Emotion’ there is no doubt in my mind that they’re still on top of their game. From the minute they hit the stage until the minute they finished their encore…they were on fire, and didn’t sit still for a second. Joe Perry *sigh* looked amazing (I had to go there…sorry boys) and sang ‘Stop Messing Around’ and also ran lead vocals on another song. (Steven had a belly) and loved showing it off to the audience…but since having his throat surgery, didn’t sound any worse for the ware. They both talked about missing Tom, and dedicated ‘Sweet Emotion’ to him. David Hull did a superb job filling in which was a huge relief. This was the first tour I remember seeing them do ‘Season’s Of Wither’ and I get a kick out seeing them perform something I never saw before. They didn’t do ‘Dream On’ but from what I understand they’re switching up set lists during this tour.
The weather held out…with only a slight shower between both bands. But it didn’t put a damper on the evening. Will I go to see Motley Crue again? Probably not. We’ve seen them last summer, solo…and now on this tour with Aerosmith. I do like Crue…but I think twice is enough. Then again…who knows? But Aerosmith….until they retire…I will continue to see them. They never disappoint. From vocals, to music, to energy and respect for their fans they show what it is to be a true ROCKER.