Umami Goes Vegas (2010): The Concerts

August 14, 2010, ninety plus degrees at nine o'clock at night.  The Freemont Street Experience is crowded with the usual crowd plus aging metal heads waiting for a free concert by Blue Oyster Cult.  The audience is packed with guys wearing fifteen year old black metal band tour t-shirts.  Umami is standing next Mike from Kansas, and his wife, who is, unfortunately, claustrophobic, short and surrounded by people a good foot taller than she is.  Mike is psyched, though, to see BOC, and so is Umami.  How cool is it to catch BOC for free?  Figure a nice, tight, hour and a half set, get to hear "Godzilla," "Burning for You," "Don't Fear the Reaper."  Heck, even "Joan Crawford" would be cool!

But BOC apparently thinks they're headlining an arena show for adoring fanatics.  They dip back into their catalog, back to their first album for "Before the Kiss" and "Cities on Flame with Rock and Roll."  Seriously?  Do they really think this crowd's here for that?  They play "Burning for You" and Umami hopes that maybe they'll start the hit parade . . . 

No such luck.  A rambling introduction about a song about a deal in the desert to buy "illegal substances" (oooh, naughty!) leads into "Then Came the Last Days of May" from, you guessed it, their first album.  It's still ninety plus degrees and now Mike's wife wants to go and Mike doesn't put up too much of a fight.  Even the guys with greying mullets and Scorpions World Tour shirts are saying they're going to walk around a little bit and will be back.  

Umami decides to walk around a bit, but not come back.  Here's video of "Don't Fear the Reaper" from that show . . . Umami's thinking maybe he made the right decision.  Could have been great, didn't work out that way.

August 17, 2010 in the climate controlled theater of the Paris Hotel, Umami is seventh row for Sgt. Pepper Live featuring Cheap Trick!   On his left is a cute Cheap Trick fan from Austin (wearing Lisa Loeb glasses!), on his right is a Beatles fan who doesn't know too much about Cheap Trick . . . she's cool anyway.  In back of Umami, however, are a half dozen drunk Real Housewives of No Class who are hooting and hollering about every stupid thing they can think of (it's a lot of hooting and hollering).  During the show, they will talk loudly and rudely while Robin Zander sings "She's Leaving Home."  The cute CT fan from Austin will call them on it, and they will respond by shouting, "we're just happy!" "we're celebrating!" and "it's Vegas!" and throwing gum at her hair.  What are they celebrating?  One of them had an adoption approved.  Apparently, this was her last chance to play the fool.  Pitiful.

But Cheap Trick is loud and awesome, and the crowd around us stands through a lot of the concert, so the Loud B1tche$ don't completely ruin the show.

Here's the set list:

I Am The Walrus - Sgt. Pepper Orchestra
Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
With a Little Help From My Friends
Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds
Getting Better
Fixing a Hole
She's Leaving Home
Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite!
Within You Without You - Indian Ensemble featuring Tom Petersson
When I'm Sixty Four
Lovely Rita
Good Morning Good Morning
Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (Reprise)
A Day in the Life
Stop This Game/The Flame/Gonna Raise Hell - Sgt. Pepper Orchestra
Dream Police
Smile
World's Greatest Lover
I Want You to Want Me
Surrender
Golden Slumbers
Carry That Weight
The End
All You Need is Love

Cheap Trick rocked these songs, not trying to replicate the studio heavy sound of the album, but instead just opening up the amps.  They dropped Rick Nielsen's guitar solos into "Fixing a Hole" and "Lovely Rita!"  "A Day in the Life" is a phenomenal song (Rolling Stone named it the greatest Beatles Song of All Time!) and Umami was very pleasantly surprised at how well it translated in concert.

Cheap Trick's own songs held up very well, especially "Dream Police" and "Surrender."   The Abbey Road sequence of "Golden Slumbers/Carry That Weight/The End" is among Umami's  favorites!

Like the "Lord of the Rings: Return of the King," there were at least three endings to the show:

• "Surrender's" refrain of "We're All Alright!  We're All Alright!"
• "The End's" benediction of "And, in the end, the love you take, is equal to the love you make."

But, honestly, in the end,  the concert, got it right with "All You Need is Love."  Lots of Pink Tissue Paper Hearts flutter down from the ceiling.  Imagine!