Eric Clapton: Across 24 Nights

We dusted off our Clapton 2006-7 North American Tour t-shirt and the Lady de Gloves was outfitted in her Clapton-Winwood shirt from a few years later and we went to see Eric Clapton: Across 24 Nights (24) at the local theatre. It was excellent, surprisingly excellent as the Lady put it. Why was the excellence a surprise? Because music documentaries are often talk, talk, talk. Talk about things long past where the subject’s drug use makes us wonder about what really happened. Often the video doesn’t have the detail you want and spends too much time watching the crowd. Instead, 24 is just great concert footage lovingly reconstructed and well organized that shows what actually happened on stage. 24 is what you would see if you were up close to the stage and nobody was in your way. If you have ever been to an Eric concert you know he isn’t big on patter. About all you hear from Eric is, “Thank You!” And when he gets really wordy, “Thank You! Thank You Very Much!” He lets his music speak and 24 does too.

24 uses footage from 24 nights of Eric concerts during 1990 and 1991 at the Royal Albert Hall in London. One of the reasons we went is we saw the Concert for George in that venue just over twenty years ago. During 24 nights, Eric had very different concerts including a small four-piece band with Phil Collins on drums, a larger (we think) fourteen-piece band, a blues review including Buddy Guy, and being backed by an orchestra. The show starts and finishes with the orchestra and the rest of the versions are spread around as Eric performs seventeen (again we think) of his hits in concert. The footage is great. We see close-ups and cut aways to all the individuals. The directing, cutting, and original footage are all impressive. We don’t know why they waited thirty years to make 24. If you are an Eric fan you must see him at the height of his powers. If you are a music fan you should see it.

Foreigner

We accompanied Lady de Gloves to see Foreigner at the Overture Center in Madison, WI just before the Great Hunkering Down.  The band let us know that loud music killed the virus so we would all be OK.

Foreigner’s tour is called Hits on Tour.  The opening band was Reverend Jack.  They were a good start to the night with about 30 minutes hard southern rock.  We liked them enough that we downloaded their single.  Foreigner came on after about a 30 minute change-over.

Sidebar: Why isn’t Foreigner in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame? They have sold lots of records, 80 million by Wikipedia’s estimate.  They have had epic hits like Juke Box Hero.  Perhaps band turnover is the reason.  That wasn’t a problem for Fleetwood Mac.  End Sidebar.

It was as advertised: The hits with lots of extra riffs.  We didn’t take notes and couldn’t find a Madison playlist but here is the average setlist that looks very close to what we heard.  There are twelve songs plus a keyboard and drum solo that took over an hour and a half. They sounded good and played with great verve. They had a choir from one of the local schools and gave a shout out to school music programs.  They had some of the original members on near the end.   Juke Box Hero was great.  It was a fun show that we would encourage you to see.  Now time will tell if they were right about the impact of volume on the COVID virus.

Paul McCartney In Madison

We accompanied the Lady de Gloves, our sister, and a friend to see Paul McCartney at the Kohl Center in Madison.  Wow! it was worth the trip.  Paul gave a three hour tour (just like Gilligan) of 38 songs from the Beatles, Wings, and his solo work.  You need to see him before this musical treasure is gone.

Paul’s voice is not the instrument it once was but he is still a joy to listen to.  What make it a great show is the songs, the organization, his presence, and his musical skills.  Paul is onstage for all three hours playing a variety of guitars, keyboards, and a (baby?) grand piano.  It makes three hours fly by.

Paul is a star and he knows it because he can still connect to us. At one point amidst all the applause he says (approximately) I think I’ll take a second to drink it all in.  It wasn’t a talk-fest like some concerts (Donovan) we have been to but he did have some great stories.  The one we liked was very brief and concerned writing Being For The Benefit Of Mr. Kite and the relationship we saw with expertise.  Paul related, as many knew, that a substantial part of the lyrics came from a poster of John’s.  Paul made a self-depreciating comment something like, “After that there wasn’t much to writing it.”  Of course there was much to it.  The first step was to see the germ of the song on the poster.  The second step was to flesh it out.  Several steps later there is a song worth including on Sgt. Pepper.

The organization of the show starts with the brass section showing up in the third (?) song in the audience in about section 105.  Shortly after they closed off part of the stage to do some of the older Beatles songs as a small group.  Later, Paul did a couple of solos on a cube that rose up (15 feet?) from the stage.  The pyrotechnics in Live And Let Die scared the bejeezus out of us.  The video content was interesting.  We especially liked the tribute to George.

And there are great songs even without playing Yesterday!  We could list a half dozen songs he should have added.  Paul is still the popular rocker he was with the Beatles so his library is 50 plus years of joy.  Sure there was a song about bullying and another about segregation (Blackbird) but it was not a woke show.  It was fun.  It was great fun.  You should see Paul while you still can.