I have to say that Arnel sounded pretty damn awesome on the upbeat stuff...especially Ask The Lonely.
I don't care for him so much on the ballads. He tries to pull the same crap Meatloaf does live. Singing lower and drawing out the lyrics WAY too long.
As far as how the new stuff went over. Basically like a lead balloon. Neil's band went from Stone In Love and having the crowd on their feet to Cain introducing the new cd, and dedicating the new song "City of Hope" to Detroit.
I noticed people re-take their seats just as the band entered the first chorus.
The cd was again mentioned before they played the only other new song "Edge of the Moment" that was introduced by Arnel. Niel didn't even get through the first few notes before the audience did the wave right back into their seats.
After Arnel finished with "Open Arms" a fan in the front row gave him a Michigan license plate that said, "JRNYFAN".
Arnel said that he was one of the biggest Journey fans in the building. Which was kinda funny because a few songs earlier he introduced lights like this. "Now we'd like to play a song from the album..............Well the song's called lights."


Anyway we took off after Faithfully. Got what I wanted by beating the traffic.