Thursday, November 29, 2007

Don & Mel aka Grand Funk? November 11th, 2007

Yep, I saw them. Here is what I remember.
I did get a warm feeling as Don and Mel walked up the stairs to the stage. It is so hard not to like these two guys.
This band, with the exception of Don Brewer, show no real excitement or energy when performing. The only real interaction with the audience from Bruce Kulick was when he was blowing warm air out into the cold air. It was really cold!!!
Mel is Mel, no reason to think he's going to move around anytime soon. I still love the guy.
Bottle Rocket, ok but only works as the opening number because everyone is just excited to see all the guys. It would never fit any where else in the set. Rock and Roll Soul/Footstompin' Music. No real problems here except Max Carl. Face it dude, you'll never approach the vocal abilities of Mark Farner.
Shinin' On............B+, nice guitar, but again Bruce, move around every once in a while. The change from guitar solo to organ solo was botched.
Locomotion, nice job.................but it almost sounded as though they ran Max's voice through some device to make it sound like Mark's vocal on the original studio version.
TNUC, minus the TNU....Don is an amazing drummer and their Rollin' & Thunder percussion number is very nice. They could have left Bruce offstage, because he added nothing to that song.
The Star Spangled Banner....another cover tune for Don and Mel
Inside Looking Out, best song from last night..................but again Bruce, take the double stick tape off the bottom of your shoes!
Some Kind of Wonderful....hey, I got some nice pictures of Don during this song.
I'm Your Captain....Don, Mel and Company played this song with much reserve. It was as if they were telling Mark in some way "Hey, this is your song, thank you for giving it to us. We will take good care of it." It did receive the loudest applause of the night.
Now, Don walks out with the red, white and blue top hat, "We're an American Band". I had had enough. I made a mild obscene gesture, grabbed our chairs and Lynn and I left. Grand Funk Revisited? yep Flint 2? yep Grand Funk Railroad? NO FREAKIN' WAY!!!
Gary Eaton

check out some photos @ : Farner Funk

1 comment:

Cruizinsuezin said...

My opinion is that the hired players (three guys to try to fill in for Mark Farner) are not in to to bringing the songs to life, they just show up and play for their pay. Not perform as a real band.