MR

Starrider wrote:That answers the question as to where Mick has been. They did a good job on keeping this under wraps.

Here is to a quick recovery for Mick. I will be looking forward to hearing Starrider again sometime soon.

Rip Rokken wrote:

Starrider wrote:That answers the question as to where Mick has been. They did a good job on keeping this under wraps.

Here is to a quick recovery for Mick. I will be looking forward to hearing Starrider again sometime soon.

Ditto - good to know what's going on. Also wishing him a speedy recovery. In the meantime, Foreigner has become the ONLY band I'd happily pay to see with 0% original members on stage. There may never be another... his hiring choices were extremely smart.

Fact Finder wrote:I just found this in todays online edition of my local rag The Enquirer. I knew Foreigner was coming to Cincy but I didn't realize it was last night.

Who needs that Foreigner when there is this Foreigner?


11:22 AM, Feb. 26, 2012


Who needs that Foreigner when you have this Foreigner?

That was the statement the crowd at the Taft Theatre was making, in the form of several standing ovations. The cheers were for the band and all of those pop-rock hits from years back, even though nobody singing or playing an instrument on stage Saturday was a member of the band when it was making hits.

The last remaining original member of the band, Mick Jones, reportedly underwent heart surgery last week. His replacement was guitarist Bruce Watson. Not much was said about Jones’ absence, other than a quick “Sitting in for Mick Jones is Mr. Bruce Watson,” from lead singer Kelly Hansen.

Nobody in the Taft – neither the crowd nor the band – appeared to be interest in thinking too much about the lineup. And to its credit, this version of Foreigner knew that the crowd didn’t want to hear any of its particular compositions. Other than a rendition of a single from 2010 called “Can’t Slow Down” and a keyboard-and-drum showcase piece, the 90-minute set included a dozen Top-40 tunes from the ‘70s and ‘80s.

The performances were really good. Watson, who has played with Rod Stewart and several others, ripped through a bunch of nice solos. Jeff Pilson from Dokken played bass and switched to acoustic guitar for his unplugged arrangement of “Say You Will.” Multi-instrumentalist Tom Gimbel handled the saxophone parts on “Urgent,” dropping to his knees during an extended solo to guarantee applause.

The star of the show was Hansen. I mean, Holy Arnel Pineda, Hansen sounds exactly like original Foreigner singer Lou Gramm. And he’s a showman too. In addition to looking like Steven Tyler, he takes some of his frontman maneuvers from him. His microphone stand was his dance partner, and at one point he walked through the crowd, atop the seatbacks, high-fiving fans along the way.

Like Tyler’s act, Hansen’s got a little bit cheesy. During “Double Vision” he repeatedly held up two fingers as he sang the chorus, to drive home the fact that he was singing not about single vision and not about triple vision, but double vision.

Hansen sang about a jukebox hero during the set closer. You could have called this version of Foreigner karaoke heroes. The Foreigner impression is spot-on.

The crowd loved the whole thing. Many of the fans with floor seats stood for most of the show. It wasn’t a sellout, but other that some empty rows at the back of the balcony, the theater was full. A representative of the promoter declined to provide attendance.

During the encore, the band enlisted the help of the 16-piece Out of the Blue choir from Clark Montessori High School on the ballad “I Want to Know What Love Is.” It was a nice moment, to be sure, but when it comes to mindless, blissful cheese-rock, “I Want to Know What Love Is” fell short of the final encore tune, “Hot Blooded.” But then, just about everything falls short of “Hot Blooded” when it comes to mindless, blissful cheese-rock.

I'm LOL @ "Holy Arnel Pineda" line....

Gideon wrote:Acoustique sounded really good from what I just heard.

AR wrote:Cool review. One disagreement with the writer - while Kelly Hansen is amazing he sounds nothing like Lou Gramm live. Kelly phrases the songs exactly to the studio versions and Lou never did (making it hard to sing along).