Saw Heart with Joan Jett and The Blackhearts opening Saturday night at Van Andel Arena in Grand Rapids MI. Heart is one of the few bands that my wife and I can enjoy about equally, so it was fun from that perspective. I have seen them several times over the years and they always put on a good show. I had also seen Jett one time before back in the 80’s or 90’s. I have never been a huge fan, but always liked some of her stuff.
Jett opened the show and did an hour of high energy straightforward punk-ish rock n roll. I loved the way the show started as when the houselights went down, the PA started blaring The Who’s “Won’t Get Fooled Again”. The entire song was played and right when it got to Roger Daltry’s big scream, Jett and her band hit the stage with a big power chord and they were off and running. It was a very very effective way to start the show. From a distance the 56 year old Jett looked just like she did 30 years ago dressed in all black leather and converse high top shoes. She has obviously kept herself in really good physical shape and was running around like a teenager the whole show. Her voice sounds exactly like it did back in the day, and I could detect no deterioration at all. She put on a high energy set with all her hits, plus several tracks from her most recent album which were impressive. The Blackhearts were tight as hell with the drummer being particularly impressive to me. As mentioned I am not really a fan of all of her stuff, but who can’t help but rocking out to “I Hate Myself For Loving You” which she did as her finale. All in all it was a great opening set that got the crowed pumped up just as a good opening should do.
Heart came out of the gate running after a 30 minute Intermission opening right off the bat with “Magic Man”. Anne Wilson’s voice is still in fantastic shape, as she has lost very little power or range. A show highlight was “Alone”, which is not one of my favorite Heart songs, but Wilson totally killed it live. Nancy did a couple of tunes too and her voice was about the same as always as well. These days Heart is pretty much the Wilson sisters with a backing cast of ever revolving band members. The drummer, bassist and guitarist have been with them for a while, but I did notice that they have a new keyboard player as the girl with the pigtails (don’t know her name) appears to no longer be with the band. The keyboard player they had was good, but rather understated in the background most of the night. The set list had a nice variety of stuff from different eras including one track off of their latest album “Fanatic” that had Wilson basically screaming her head off. Along with the hits I enjoyed hearing some of the more obscure tracks like “There’s The Girl” (Nancy Wilson song) and the rocker “If Looks Could Kill”. They also threw in a killer cover of Robin Trower’s “Day Of The Eagle” which was cool. The encore was all Led Zeppelin as they pulled out 3 Zep tracks. “No Quarter” was particularly impressive. My only gripe would be, that for a big arena show, the production was rather pedestrian. This is the first arena show I have been to in many years that did not have big screens which seems odd these days. The light show was pretty sparse, although what they had they used effectively. All in all it was a great night of female fronted rock n roll.
Here are the setlists:
JOAN JETT:
BAD REPUTATION
CHERRY BOMB
DO YOU WANNA TOUCH ME
TMI
YOU DRIVE ME WILD
LIGHT OF DAY
MAKE IT BACK
ANY WEATHER
THE FRENCH SONG
I LOVE ROCK N ROLL
CRIMSON AND CLOVER
I HATE MYSELF FOR LOVING YOU
ENCORE:
REAL WILD CHILD
HEART:
MAGIC MAN
HEARTLESS
WHAT ABOUT LOVE
KICK IT OUT
STRAIGHT ON
MASHALLAH
BEBE LE STRANGE
THERE’S THE GIRL
THESE DREAMS
ALONE
DAY OF THE EAGLE (Robin Trower Cover)
IF LOOKS COULD KILL
CRAZY ON YOU
BARRACUDA
ENCORE:
IMMIGRANT SONG (Zep Cover)
NO QUARTER (Zep Cover)
MISTY MOUNTAIN HOP (Zep cover)
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