Really enjoyed the show last night with the Van Halen trio and Roth at the helm, even though Roth had some issues here and there. Expect a full review soon.

In the meantime, here’s the set list from last night.

Unchained
Runnin’ With the Devil
She’s the Woman
Romeo Delight
Tattoo
Everybody Wants Some
Somebody Get Me a Doctor
China Town
Hear About It Later
Pretty Woman
Drum Solo
You Really Got Me
The Trouble With Never
Dance the Night Away
I’ll Wait
Hot for Teacher
Women in Love
Outta Love Again
Beautiful Girls
Ice Cream Man
Panama
Ed Solo
Ain’t Talkin ‘Bout Love
Jump

Bout to get on the road to see Van Halen with David Lee Roth at the helm. This’ll be a first. I’ve seen Roth during the Sans Halen tour with Hagar, but this will be the first time seeing him with the Van Halen family. I dig the new album, A Different Kind of Truth, and hope they feature a bunch of those tracks mixed in with the classic tracks from the late 70′s to early 80′s.

Come to think of it, it’d even be cool if “Me Wise Magic” or “Can’t Get That Stuff No More” were thrown in there. Doubt it, but how cool would it be to hear those rare gems live?

I’m super-psyched. Hope it rocks. Expect a review of the concert soon.

I’m pretty psyched about this. While they had a small set of fans, Frequency and Amplitude never really tok off on the Playstation 2, but were the first attempts at rhythm music games. The two titles paved the way for the Guitar Hero and Rock Band franchises, albeit using the traditional controller, instead of a plastic guitar or drumkit.

I’m pretty excited to see Rock Band Blitz going back to those roots — with a few new twists and improvements.

Now if I had a working (non red-ringed) Xbox 360 to download this to. Saving ever so slowly…

Rock Band Blitz Announced for PSN/XBLA, Can Access Existing Rock Band DLC

When you’re a master of multiple instruments and you have an ultra-successful band, you really get the means to experiment with a lot of musical gear.

A co-worker sent the link below to me the other day. It highlights all of the guitar gear rig and equipment Foo Fighters’ Dave Grohl uses.

Foo Fighters – Dave Grohl’s Guitar Gear Rig and Equipment

I’ll bet this is going to be crazy — Steel Panther at the House of Blues down in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.

Steel Panther is kind of like a metal version of Spinal Tap, but doing that isn’t really doing justice to Steel Panther, nor Tap.

While there’s more than a hint of humor, they’re actually great musicians and do tribute on their albums to some of the greats from metal and hard rock including Van Halen, Poison, Bon Jovi and many more.

Check out the video below if you’ve never heard them.

Too bad the Myrtle Beach concert is a Thursday night.

Steel Panther Coming to House of Blues, Myrtle Beach

Started listening to this at work this afternoon while I was coding — it’s a complete collection of all things Van Halen over the years on the Howard Stern show.

Heard a promo for this before it aired, and glad I’m finally getting to digest it all. Roth makes for a good interview and good information. I’m a little more than halfway through it. I’ve heard a few of the interviews, but most of it is new [to me], and I’m eating it up.

Howard Stern Presents “Van Halen – The Whole Truth” – Complete

So here’s a recent explanation by Van Halen’s David Lee Roth on the old 80′s contract rider about no brown M&M’s. Great story if you hadn’t heard it before.

I first heard this real story about the famous (and infamous) contract rider when Roth took over on the radio for Howard Stern when Stern jumped ship for satellite radio.

Brown M&Ms from Van Halen on Vimeo.

As Amanda and I are laying here watching the 64th Grammy Awards, my wife is feeling nostalgic with Jennifer Hudson’s performance of the now late Whitney Houston’s rendition of “I Will Always Love You.”

I’m just feeling old though. I didn’t recognize any of the best new artist nominees. I knew none of the rap songs (and only one of the artist combos in that category: Jay-Z and Kanye).

Out of all the performers tonight, I only cared about seeing the Foo Fighters and Kelly Clarkson — and Kelly Clarkson was only on to perform the duet with Jason Aldean, which she totally carries. I wish she had the opportunity to perform something from her Stronger album. I’m biased, but still.

I don’t get the Nicki Minaj thing. I think music should be about, well the music. Screw this performance art BS, and lip syncing crap. Both the Foos and Clarkson I can appreciate as true artists — whose albums and live performances rival each other.

I just feel old after tonight’s Grammy Awards. I’ll go back to my rotation of Foo Fighters, Kelly Clarkson and Van Halen now.

P.S. I did appreciate the end jam session with Sir Paul McCartney, Bruce Springsteen, Dave Grohl and others — that was real music and talent in my book.

January 31, 2012 marked the only date on Kelly Clarkson Stronger Tour where she performed in North Carolina. Luckily, it was nearly in our backyard — in downtown Durham.

The location was for the Clarkson concert was the three year old Durham Performing Arts Center — a theatre-like venue with two balcony level.

We were lucky enough to be on the ground level — just ten rows from the stage.

The opening act was Matt Nathanson, whom I hadn’t heard of, but turns out he’s had seven albums, with a few hits like “Come On Get Higher” and “Faster.” His hour set included a lot of selections from his latest album, Modern Love. The tracks were good, though Nathanson dancing and gyrations were a little strange and distacting.

Kelly had a cool stage setup, consisting of a shallow front stage area that had a semi-transparent curved screen behind it that could be quickly be raised and lowered. Behind it, there were several cylindrical risers where the drummer, keyboardist and backup singers had a little elevation above the stage.

The set started out with the lullaby-like intro from Stronger‘s “Dark Side,” while tabloid-like headlines were projected on the large curved screen a la the Mr. Know It All music video.

The dynamic verses versus choruses of “Dark Side” were a perfect opening song. Right away, it was obvious Kelly Clarkson’s voice was as strong as ever, and she was going to do justic to the studio tracks from Stronger and her past catalog.

Kelly then belted out energetic versions of “Behind These Hazel,” “Eyes Since U Been Gone” and “Gone,” all from her 2004 Breakaway album.

Despite having five albums to draw from, Clarkson found time in the set to do three covers — all of which rivaled, if not beat the originals: Florence + the Machine’s “Heavy in Your Arms,” fellow American Idol alum Carrie Underwood’s “I Know You Won’t” and Sara Bareilles’ “Gravity.”

The band did great arrangements for all three covers, especially for “Heavy in Your Arms,” where the semi-transparent screen was brought down, while Kelly sang in the middle of the audience and the drummer played the march-like beat on a single drum — really neat rendition that made me a fan of the song — Kelly’s version more so than the original.

Another cool arrangement was a medley that featured an abbreviated of a track from each of her five albums, on this final night of January included “The Trouble With Love Is,” “Walk Away,” “How I Feel” and “I Want You” — all good choices and a good variation of ballads and upbeat tunes.

For her hit duet with country singer Jason Aldean, “Don’t You Wanna Stay” they again employed the curved screen — this time projecting a larger-than-life Aldean, so that Clarkson and ALdean could do a virtual duet. I wonder if Jason Aldean has a larger-than-life Kelly Clarkson during his concert? But at either venue — no offense to Aldean, but Clarkson really carries the song and makes it the hit that it is.

Between songs, Kelly was very entertaining and interactive with the crowd, exuding her down-to-home manner that’s always been evident in most any interview she’s done.

The concert was weighted heavily to the latest Stronger album, with Breakaway a close second. The only downside to having five successful albums is the setlist is never going to be able to include every song.

The encore was as great as the rest of the concert, with starting with a piano and vocal only “Never Again,” making it a bit more sinister, but very enjoyable. Clarkson even admitted the minimal arrangement made it sound even more evil.

She then ended the concert with three of her big hits over her still young career — “Because of You,” “Mr. Know It All” and “Miss Independent.”

The near two hour set flew by. There really weren’t any down moments, and Kelly’s vocals were spot on throughout. Song after song, Kelly exhibited a super-strong voice, a personable demeanor and evidence she’s got a long career ahead of her.

This was the second concert my wife and I had seen of Kelly’s. This one was markedly better, and makes us already anticipating her next appearance in North Carolina.

Amanda and I were lucky enough to see the Kelly Clarkson concert in downtown Durham last night after a long spell of not seeing a single show.

Our last was several years back. Just looking it up, it was more than several years — in fact it was our first Kelly Clarkson show in Charlotte back in 2005. Wow.

Anyway, I’ll write up a full review of the show in the coming days, but in the meantime, here’s the set list she played last night at the DPAC downtown:

Dark Side
Behind These Hazel Eyes
Since U Been Gone
Gone
You Love Me
Heavy in Your Arms (Florence and the Machine cover)
Gravity (Sara Bareilles cover)
Medley – The Trouble With Love Is / Walk Away / How I Feel / I Want You
I Know You Won’t (Carrie Underwood cover)
Don’t You Wanna Stay
Let Me Down
I Forgive You
Already Gone
Breakaway
You Still Won’t Know What It’s Like
Stronger
My Life Would Suck Without You

-Encore-

Never Again (Acoustic piano only)
Because of You
Mr. Know It All
Miss Independent

Great set. Quick stats on the breakdown of tracks per album (including the medley, but not the covers and the 1 yet-to-be-released track):
Thankful: 2 Tracks
Breakaway: 6 Tracks
My December: 2 Tracks
All I Ever Wanted: 3 Tracks
Stronger: 7 Tracks

Not surprisingly, Stronger — the newest album had the most tracks, but Breakway had almost as many, with My December and Thankful being under represented. As you get more albums, it’s bound to happen. More greats tracks have to be mothballed unless you do a monster multi-hour set.

My full concert review will be coming soon.