TobiasFunke82's Blog

 

 

 

The Class Clown of rock n roll amused a decent sized crowd on Saturday night, for what was the Fair’s only Classic Rock concert this year.

 

 

 

Joe Walsh is funny. Not just funny looking with his long white hair, but also downright humorous. His often unintelligible spoken word in between songs is an absolute riot. When I saw him a few years back perform with The Eagles, he ran around the stage in pajama pants and a construction hat with a built-in camera for the audience. However, at the Grandstand he stood in one place and was all business for just over an hour.

 

 

 

For 3 hours of The Eagles I paid $80, so I guess $22 for a little over an hour is the correct math. However, you would think that Joe would want to blow audiences away with all of his best tracks, but on Saturday he left off two of my favorites from the set list. I was shocked when the show ended with Life In the Fast Lane and we had yet to hear A Life Of Illusion and All Night Long – two songs where Joe’s musical talent reach new heights. Good ole Joe did remember to include my absolute favorite Walsh tune Ordinary Average Guy, which by the way is the ideal bar hangout tune. Immediately when the synthesizer starts I want to crack open a Coors and play darts with my buds.

 

 

 

The remainder of the set saw song highlights from his extensive solo career, James Gang days and of course classics like In The City from his flight with The Eagles. Turn To Stone, Walk Away, Funk #49, Life’s Been Good and Rocky Mountain Way made the short set a rocking one. *I knew it would be a bit of a long shot to hear, but Waffle Stomp would have meshed brilliantly after Ordinary Average Guy.

 

 

 

I have to knit pick now, which may come across as snobbish, but I still have to address the awful camera work at the Joe Walsh show. Why on earth would you ever continuously show a long shot on the jumbo vision? I can see that part with my eyes. The jumbo vision is meant to show close-ups of what my eyes cannot see. The camera would start to zoom in on Joe’s fingering during a guitar solo, but then quickly zoom out to a long shot again. And, when Joe introduced his band, the camera was one step behind each time he introduced a member (Example: the camera was still on the bass player when he was introducing the drummer). I had really close seats so the camera work did not ruin the concert for me, but it did make me take note of the difference between Grandstand camera work and the professional camera work at Riverport (Yes, I know its no longer Riverport, but it will always be Riverport to me) . On Friday, when I attend the Rush concert at Riverport, I’m sure the camera will zoom in enough so that I can count the hairs on Geddy Lee’s goatee. I had heard people complain about the sound quality from earlier concerts in the week, and perhaps the Grandstand’s technical difficulties are a couple of reasons why Fair attendance is decreasing.

 

 

 

Though I did not get to hear Joe utter “just a pinch between the cheek and gum” he still gave a fabulous performance, and no one can work a talk box like Walsh.