Lynyrd Skynyrd and Kid Rock – A Saturday Night Special

 

We were at the Comcast Center in Mansfield, MA (formerly Great Woods) on Saturday night to see Lynyrd Skynyrd & Kid Rock on their Rock and Rebels tour.

It was a hot, sunny day - we got there at about 2:30 and tailgated all afternoon. It was the first time in a looong time that the atmosphere felt like the old Great Woods…everyone was mingling together having a great time, and no one got harassed by the event staff. When you put it all together – the sights (flags waving, footballs flying, hundreds of Harleys); the sounds (a blaring mix of southern rock, outlaw country and blues); the smells (charcoal grills and all kinds of funny things) - the general consensus seemed to be: music and whiskey makes us want to get down

Skynyrd opened the show. They still sound great! Kid Rock always puts on an incredibly energetic, entertaining live show. It is absolutely one of those cases where, even if you aren’t really a fan going in, you’d come out of the concert as a Kid Rock fan. And for this show he had a couple surprise guests too: he did a miniset with Rev Run consisting of Run D.M.C.’s It’s Like That and Aerosmith’s Walk this Way; then, Peter Wolf (former J. Geils frontman) came out and they did Centerfold. It was kick-ass!

Read Full Post »

Eric Clapton Gets His Mojo Workin’ in Mansfield

Elicia mentioned in her earlier post that we saw the legendary Eric Clapton last night at Great Woods in Mansfield (a.k.a Tweeter Center, and as of yesterday, Comcast Center). I miss the old days of roaming the lawn, but it is still a terrific venue to see a concert and we all had a great time getting our mojo workin’ too! Clapton and his band were amazing – they played a very cool, energetic set of mostly blues songs, including a bunch of covers. He covered Jimi Hendrix, Willie Dixon, Robert Johnson, Blind Joe Reynolds, Muddy Water, Bill Broonzy, Otis Rush, Bo Diddley, and others. I’m a huge fan of blues music so it was a sweet surprise and just an all around awesome display (I mean, if you want to hear all his “hits,” you can always pop in a CD). My favorite song of the night might have been his spine-tingling cover of Little Wing but – wow – it is a really tough call.

Robert Randolph and the Family Band opened the show with a 45-minute set of their unique foot-stompin’, country-funk-blues style, including I Need More Love, Deliver Me, an instrumental cover of Voodoo Child, and a tribute to the late Bo Diddley.

Here are the local papers’ reviews of the show: Boston Globe, Boston Herald, The Providence Journal. And here is Clapton’s set list from the show:

1. Motherless Children
2. Key to the Highway
3. Hoochie-Coochie Man
4. Little Wing
5. Outside Woman Blues
6. Double Trouble
7. Don’t Knock My Love
8. Driftin’ Blues
9. Rockin’ Chair
10. Motherless Child
11. Traveling Riverside Blues
12. Running on Faith
13. Tell the Truth
14. Little Queen of Spades
15. Before You Accuse Me
16. Wonderful Tonight
17. Layla
18. Cocaine
19. Got My Mojo Workin’ (with Robert Randolph)

Read Full Post »

Wacky Week – Our House Didn’t Burn Down

This week might just be my wackiest yet of 2008.

So, to kick things off on Monday night I attended the Publicity Club of New England’s annual Bell Ringers – the Oscars of the New England PR world. I enjoyed myself – food was good and I loved the steel drum band. The award show usually runs about 4 hours, so I didn’t get home until after 11pm. After getting only about 3 hours of sleep, Dan and I were then ripped from our slumber by the pungent smell of burning house.

I guess some old wires short circuited behind one of the walls in the hallway that leads up to the apartment above us (we live in a two-family). We stood out on the curb for 2 hours while about 20 Newton firemen gathered around the house, geared up and then entered the “danger zone.” Our apartment didn’t suffer any damage – as the fire stayed within the walls – but the whole house was filled to the brim with smoke. The couple that lives upstairs, however, haven’t really been home since the fire because they can’t use their bathroom (the firemen had to rip up the walls to extinguish the fire in the wall on the floor below.)

    

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

On top of all this, work has been hectic. We made a HUGE announcement for one of my clients, so we’ve been busy, to say the least. In addition, Dan and I went to go see Eric Clapton last night at Great Woods (aka The Comcast Center, formerly the Tweeter Center). The concert was a blast. The second we walked through the gates I said to Dan’s mom “so, what are the chances we’re going to run into someone we know?” Out of the thousands of people at the venue, within minutes of us being there, we ran into a whole family that we knew from Hopkinton. I called it.

Because of the fire, we’ve also had workers in and out of our apartment – insurance adjusters, cleaning crews, electricians, and the like. Luckily I’ve got a couple days off – and I need them. My sister’s bridal shower is this weekend and I’ve got to wrap up the planning. Can you say “go, go, go?”

Despite all the craziness, we were really lucky that the fire wasn’t worse. There was no damage to our “stuff”, and, more importantly, no one got hurt!

Read Full Post »