Prince + More: Nostalgia Night 2009! (3/28/09)

To promote his new, 3-CDs-At-Once release, Prince announced he would play 3 shows at 3 venues in LA on the same night. Thanks to a friend getting great tix for free at work, I got to attend the 1st of the 3 sold-out shows, which was at the Nokia Theater. Upon entering the room, you could immediately feel the energy that comes with a hot ticket show. It reminded me of the vibe at Chicago’s Rosemont Horizon for the Purple Rain show back in the day (one of my first-ever and favorite concerts). Basically, people were just damn psyched. As the full house waited for Prince to come out and the PA blasted danceable hits from the 80s (including hits by Prince and Michael Jackson), Magic Johnson came walking in to take his seat. The people in each section Magic walked by in his seat-hunt jumped up to give him a standing ovation. It was like watching the wave at a college football game as the mixed-race crowd stood to honor the legend during his long walk through the theater.

Prince took the stage and proved that he hasn’t lost a step or aged a bit since those days of Purple Rain. In fact, he appeared more confident and at the same time more gracious and appreciative of his ability to bring people together to celebrate his music. At one point he told us that a friend of his said, “music is what we do” but Prince told him, “no, I AM music…we are all music…and music is what brings us together”. He was backed by great musicians that included a female drummer, a harmonica soloist, 3 background singers, a bass player and a keyboard player. Prince shredded on guitar and worked the room like only the best can. He played around 2 new songs, both of which unfortunately sucked. The rest of the show focused on hits and covers. The hits included “Let’s Go Crazy”, “Controversy”, “I Feel For You”, “If I Was Your Girlfriend”, “Kiss”, “1999”, and “Purple Rain”. The covers included an insane, funked up jam of “Play That Funky Music White Boy”, “Crimson and Clover” with GREAT guitar work, The Beatles’ “Come Together”, Edgar Winter Band’s “Frankenstein”, and a Prince-less, harmonica-led sick cover of Hendrix’s “Little Wing”. The encores were awesome – he did 2 songs The Time recorded: The Bird and Jungle Love! Then Sheila E came out to drum and sing “The Glamorous Life”! The crowd went ballistic. For anyone who grew up in the 80s, the closing half hour felt like being sent back in a time machine to a great mid-80s party. Everyone walked out with an ear-to-ear grin.

As we got in the car, my friend said she also had free tickets to see Tom Morello’s side project away from Rage Vs the Machine, so we ran over to the Fonda Theater in Hollywood. We walked in to the half-filled club as Tom was playing some lame song and some wasted 22 year-old in the crowd was puking his guts out in the area we wanted to hang. I was ready to circle back to the door and go home when Tom invited his friends Slash and Jerry Cantrell (Alice In Chains) to the stage to play “Wish You Were Here”! Then Sen Dog from Cypress Hill took the stage to lead the band in “Insane In the Brain” and “Rock Superstar”. Then the singer from Slipknot took the stage and became Axl Rose as Slash led the band in rocking versions of “It’s So Easy” and “Paradise City”. The crowd went crazy! Then, and this is truly strange, the band played a rocking cover of "Play That Funky Music White Boy". I haven't checked the Guiness Book but has anyone else gone to TWO concerts in the same night (weddings excluded) and heard that song played BOTH times?! Nostalgia Night 2009 was a blast.

The funniest part of the night was the Earth Hour celebration in downtown Los Angeles, showing how we can all save power by turning our lights out for an hour all around the world. As we walked out of the Prince show, we walked through the Earth Hour celebration as we headed to the car. Every network news camera was there to cover what was LITERALLY a few lights in a courtyard being turned off while a DJ played crappy music to a crowd of people who had nothing better to do. There was Los Angeles, making its best effort to show the world how “green” we can be: turning off 3 lights and celebrating it. We would have stood around to laugh for a few minutes but we had to run to the next nostalgia event.