Shlock at The Rock
All the hype, the anticipation, the planning and scrambling failed to deliver the payoff as Bon Jovi opened the Prudential Center in Newark on Thursday night – The Rock, if you will -- the first of 10 shows they’ll be playing over the next week and a half.
A couple of months ago, I got a call from Jersey Girl, who was on a business trip in San Francisco, and she stated the obvious – something I still don’t know why I didn’t think of first: Bon Jovi was playing the first ever event at the new arena in Newark and we HAD to be there for the opener.
Of course, I agreed, and eventually was able to secure a pair of tickets for opening night, two of the last available for a show that would soon sell out.
A classic New Jersey evening, of course, requires a classic New Jersey dining experience, so after we met up at the A&P parking lot in Kenilworth, where Jersey Girl stashed her vehicle, we headed to the Tropicana Diner on the Elizabeth/Union/Hillside border, right down the street from Phil Rizzuto Park.
And while neither of us were about to order the same type of meal we would have ordered as teenagers – I had a nice chef salad, while Jersey Girl enjoyed a grilled chicken sandwich with a side of rice substituted for French fries – anything consumed at a real Jersey diner was well worth it.
Fed, we headed for Newark.
Now, the original plan was to drive to Hillside, park at my mom’s hut and, in an effort to avoid what promised to be a parking cluster-fuck, have my brother drop us off at the arena and then take a cab back to Hillside post-show. Unfortunately, that didn’t work out, as my brother had some last minute shit to take care of in Brooklyn that night and wouldn’t be around to take us. After tossing around a couple of alternate ideas, we decided that I would just drive to the arena and risk whatever parking issues would arise.
Amazingly, the parking situation was, probably, the highlight of the evening.
We arrived at the arena and parked in the garage right next door, even with the $25 price tag. As we made the short walk to the arena’s south entrance, I got a call from my boy, Matt – he of the plan to fly up from Florida to join me for Bon Jovi twice over the past couple of years and then not show up. He and I are always trying to get a jump on setlists, trying to figure what they’ll open with, what rarities they’ll play, etc., and Matt said he had been reading tales online and that Bon Jovi had rehearsed a couple of deep cuts from back in the diz-uh, including “Wild is the Wind.” He also said he’d read that Bon Jovi had planned a lot of surprises for opening night and wouldn’t be playing a lot off the new album, “Lost Highway” until later in the tour.
This, of course, fired me up to no end and I began feeling that giddy anticipation I usually get before a show as we prepared to enter.
Now, we kind of got an inclination that the arena was not quite ready for opening night. First, we had both heard from The Professor that there were things that were still not done when he visited last week. We also passed windows looking in at the Devils’ practice rink as we walked toward the entrance, and there were still things that needed tiding, wires hanging out, shit like that.
But as we approached the entrance of the arena, it looked great. Shiny, new -- almost as if we weren’t in Newark. We even found out later that there was, apparently, a red carpet with some celebrities arriving, but, thankfully, we never happened upon any of that.
We headed in, and the employees were all very nice, wishing everyone a cheerful “Welcome to The Rock” as they waved the electric wands over our persons and checked our belongings.
Other than a faint smell of fresh paint, it is a beautiful arena and it had all the promise of a great evening.
That’s when we realized we weren’t alone in being fired up.
As we headed up the first escalator to the 100-level, there were balconies off to the right for smokers. About a block from the arena on a rooftop parking deck – in plain sight for all to see – we all got a nice treat in the form of a car fire.
Let me just say this: While the story I’ve linked to claims the fire was “put out very quickly,” let me assure you – and Jersey Girl will attest to this – that is complete bullshit. We watched that fucker burn for a good five minutes or so before we lost interest and moved on, and by then the firefighters still hadn’t arrived.
Anyway, after that bit of excitement and quick trip to the very impressive bathrooms, we headed to our seats in Section 233 – that’s when the evening took a turn in a southerly direction.
I don’t know if the power that be just wanted to cram as many seats into the arena as possible, or if someone fucked up in their haste to have the building finished on time, but the seats in Section 233 were simply too fucking small – and I’m not just saying that as a man of considerably size. There were several people in our section – men and women alike, all smaller than me – that were also having trouble with their seats.
Even Jersey Girl, who is of average girth, was having trouble getting comfortable.
Thankfully, one of the cats who was having trouble with his seat complained to an usher, who contacted her supervisor, and the gentlemen was kind enough to relocate us, as well as the others, to Section 214, which not only had bigger seats, but was just to the right of the stage – our original vantage point had us in the far left corner of the arena, as far from the action as you can be.
Crisis averted. Seats upgraded. My master plan of all those late-night trips to through the drive thru and meals made of fried food, chocolate and cheese was finally paying off!
As we settled into our new seats amid the “Let’s Go Devils” and “Rangers Suck” chants that, for some strange reason, people felt the need to share at a rock concert, we got ready for My Chemical Romance, which was to be the opening band. I was looking around for some Devils fan to slap, but there was none in my immediate vicinity, and, frankly, I didn’t feel like getting up.
The people who had been transplanted from out original section began arriving in our new home, including a couple that had to be in their 70s. Nice people, but I think the lady actually through she was breaking news when she informed us that Jon Bon Jovi was from Sayreville. Of course, we chatted about how much of an improvement these seats were, and she let us know about the awful flight they had taken that morning on Lufthansa Airlines from Frankfort to Newark, and how cramped the seats were on the plane.
Good tip. Avoid Germany. My rabbi thanks you.
Anyway, MCR came on at about 7:35 p.m – five minutes late – and while I’m sure they’re very nice boys and the kids really dig ‘em, we didn’t know one friggin’ song. I mean, we had both heard of this band, but I was surprised that none of their tunes rang a bell. I thought I recognized the final tune of their 45-minute set from playing MLB The Show on Playstation 3 with my brother, but I could be wrong. The band was fine, I guess, though the lead singer looked like a Robert Smith knockoff, rolling his eyes in his own private orgasm.
After MCR’s delightful serenading, it was time for a walk. I needed a cigarette, and Jersey Girl was kind enough to accompany me on my trek to find the smoking area.
We met some wonderful people on our quest. The arena staff who had good intentions, but, for the most part, had no idea what was what and where was where in the building, as well as a nice tattooed gentleman in one of the stairwells, who was also looking for a place to pollute his lungs. He shared his belief that it was only a matter of time before the nice new, clean arena was overrun with graffiti and other eye, nose and throat sores, being that it was in Newark, and, to be honest, we couldn’t whole-heartedly disagree.
Nice guy.
After circling the arena, we finally found a suitable place for me to smoke, and as I enjoyed my stogie with some other fine folks, we admired the run down surroundings of The Rock.
It seemed to me that someone would have realized that property value in the surrounding area would be going up and purchased and renovated the abandoned and boarded up buildings next to the arena, but alas, no.
Where Tony Soprano when you need him?
We headed back to our seats and it was time for Bon Jovi.
The house lights went down and the stage lights came on, and the background scenery, which was set up to look like a bar or restaurant of some sort, came to life.
One at a time, the members of the band came onto the stage, some carrying cases of beer, some acting like patrons, and they started playing some country tune.
Something told me they weren’t about to launch into “Let It Rock.”
As Jon arrived on stage, the band kicked into “Lost Highway,” the title track from the new album, which was predictable, although not, as I had hoped, a deep cut or a classic.
So be it.
Unfortunately, things didn’t improve.
After the opening tune, they played “You Give Love a Bad Name,” and proceeded to complete the first nine songs of the set, much to my chagrin, five of them were from the new album.
Not a good way to start, sirs.
Additionally, we just weren’t feeling it. We weren’t vibing the normal energy of a Bon Jovi show.
Several factors could explain this unfortunate situation:
We were very high up, the top-most section of the arena and couldn’t even make out much of what Jon was saying to the crowd between songs. The full sound simply wasn’t reaching us, which was made obvious by the fact that we could hear each other speak without yelling into one another’s ear.
Our section wasn’t close to full, and many of the people there might not have been hardcore Bon Jovi fans, being this was a comp section. Most of the people in 214 remained seated throughout the show.
We were both stone cold sober.
Still, we did the best we could to enjoy the show. The band sounded as best as could be expected, considering it was the first show of the tour and the acoustics in the building – or at least where we were – sucked.
I was not enjoying this as I should have been, to the point where all my negativity prompted Jersey Girl to tell me something along the lines of “shut the fuck up until you have something positive to say.”
Finally, at song #12 of the set, I had a reason to say something nice, as the band played “These Days,” a tune I had not heard them play live since the tour by the same name in 1996. And while I was fired up as all hell, my enthusiasm was somewhat dampened by the fact that Richie Sambora and not JBJ sang lead on the song.
Unfortunately, they ruined it two songs later by playing “Blaze of Glory.” Not that I don’t like to song, but the fuckers went and played the version off that bastardly album “This Left Feels Right,” which they released a few years ago containing new, shitty versions of some of their classics, and I was not very happy about that.
Of course, the fact that they played my favorite of their tunes “Blood on Blood” during the encore somewhat salvaged the evening – they play the song regularly, but not at every show – so by the time they finished off with “Livin on a Prayer” and “Wanted Dead or Alive,” the evening wasn’t a total disaster.
Neither was the trip out of the arena and out of Newark.
Thanks to some nice work by Jersey Girl finding the staircase that would take us from our section right out to the parking garage, we were at the car and on our way within minutes of the house lights coming on.
We hit a little bit of traffic looping around and down to McCarter Highway, but once we hit Route 21 we were home free.
We hit a McDonalds drive thru on the way so I could quench an awful thirst with a large Diet Coke, while Jersey Girl indulged in a chocolate sundae.
To sum it up, the location and potential parking issues were not a problem, that all went smoothly, despite my worst fears. The arena is beautiful, and will probably be even better once everything has its finishing touches, they replace certain seats, and the staff learns where everything is. The band was good, not great, but they really need to stop playing so many damn new songs – they played 8 of the 12 tunes from the new album.
I am returning for the Nov. 4 show, when my seats will be better and I do not plan on arriving sober. That, in and of itself, should make for a better concert experience.
THURSDAY NIGHT’S SETLIST
* = from new album
1. Lost Highway*
2. You Give Love a Bad Name
3. Summertime*
4. Born to be My Baby
5. Older
6. Whole Lot of Leavin’*
7. Make a Memory*
8. It's my Life
9. We Got it Goin' On*
10. Have a Nice Day
11. In These Arms
12. These Days (Richie on lead vocal)
13. Seat Next to You*
14. Blaze of Glory (This Left Feels Right version)
15. I Love This Town*
16. I'll Sleep When I'm Dead
17. Raise Your Hands
18. Bad Medicine/Shout
19. Who Says You Can't Go Home?
ENCORE
20. Any Other Day*
21. Blood on Blood
22. Livin' on a Prayer
23. Wanted Dead or Alive
posted by SJPSandman at
8:21 PM
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