BRISTOW, Va. – Never ignore the power of fondmemories.
Summer amphitheater trips are often packaged affairs equipped with likeminded – and era-specific – bands.
The Letting it Go Show, including Boy George and Culture Club, Howard Jones and Berlin, is a present to fans of ‘80s music, mainly because the artists all still deal powerful collections of brain-ingrained hits.
At Jiffy Lube Live amphitheater in Virginia Friday – a couple of weeks into the trip that will cover Aug. 20 in Concord, California – a generation-spanning crowd patiently waitedfor the trio of acts after a prolonged lightning hold-up.
Their benefit was a heady bundle of musical memories.
Here are some highlights from the reveal, along with the artists’ abbreviated set lists.
Kylie Minogue strikes Vegas: The British star is preparation a residency in November
Berlin makes the most of a brief set
With arms outstretched, Berlin maven Terri Nunn , 62, welcomed an gushing audience that was pleased to see the band, however likewise happy the program began after a almost 90-minute wait.
Unfortunately, Berlin was required to be specifically affordable with their set, carryingout 4 tunes in 20 minutes.
Understanding the time crunch, the 5 artists sharing the phase – consistingof establishing member John Crawford and ‘80s-era member David Diamond on guitar – rightaway tore into the New Wave splendor of “No More Words” and “The Metro,” their cascading synthesizers still expressive and their tunes enduring.
Nunn, sporting hallmark black streaks in her white-blond hair, sounded record-perfect as she skyrocketed through the band’s No. 1 hit, the longlasting “Top Gun” ballad, “Take My Breath Away.” The small vocalist, clothed in a sleeveless black gown, strolled (with a bodyguard) a coupleof rows into the crowd to sing, dealingwith the back part of the location and leading fans in swaying their arms overhead.
Longtime fans of the band were unquestionably delighted to see Crawford trade lyrics with Nunn on “Sex (I’m A …)” as they stalked each other on phase, taking more heat to an currently steamy night.
Berlin set list
- “No More Words”
- “The Metro”
- “Take My Breath Away”
- “Sex (I’m A …)”
Howard Jones marks 40 years of ‘New Song’
The genial keyboard wizard began his set with an simple required: “We play with overall energy and you sing every tune,” he stated.
Backed by a four-piece band consistingof interesting bassist/Chapman stick gamer Nick Beggs, Jones, 68, bopped around anumberof neon-glowing poles stationed around the phase, often leaning over his synthesizer, other times getting the mic for an impassioned note.
A revamped piano take on “New Song” consistedof Jones, his upper variety in fine type, striking some long keepsinmind apparently easily. At 40 years old, the tune still maintains a springy youthfulness.
Personable and thoughtful throughout his 30-minute set, Jones tucked away his happiness for his plaintive ballad, “What is Love?,” which he instilled with pathos as it intensified into a significant wall of noise of keyboards and electrical guitar and ended on a actual high note.
Jones covered his effective set with “Things Can Only Get Better,” the audience gladly screaming the “whoa, whoa, whoa-oh-o” part of the chorus as Jones smiled his method through the perky bop.
Howard Jones set list
- “Like to Get to Know You Well”
- “Everlasting Love”
- “New Song”
- “What is Love?”
- “Things Can Only Get Better”
Culture Club happily rollicks through ‘80s classics
Few can make an entryway as happily as Boy George and on this night, he and Culture Club chose to start with a tune they hadactually been conserving for the repetition at previous reveals – a smokingcigarettes variation of the Rolling Stones’ “Sympathy for the Devil.”
“When I passaway – if I passaway – I wanna be Mick Jagger,” he stated with the veryfirst of numerous wicked smiles flashed throughout the hour-ish set.
Flanked by fellow initial Culture Club members Mikey Craig on bass and Roy Hay on guitar and keyboards, Boy George, 62, looked perfectly attractive in layers of black and blue