The only thing that I would disagree about would be the rant about Wolfgang. At 16, I wouldn’t expect much stage presence, and it will take him awhile to be comfortable out there. He went from playing at dad’s studio, to thousands of screaming fans overnight for goodness sakes!! I’m sure he’ll get better.

There was no doubt about the “mic sharing” situations. It happened a few different times, and it sounded terrible each time. Ear monitors are nice, but good old fashioned stage monitors are about the only way to overcome that. For what they have…they should stick with their own mics. I couldn’t agree more.

I’m not sure Dave’s singing was quite as good as he indicated, but who cares? Few if any singers pull out the stops on those huge tours…there’s only so much a voice can take. For arena rock…I thought he did as well as I expected.

No more long posts on this issue, other than to say that it was a BLAST. The author didn’t mention that NO ONE sat down the entire show, and it accomplished the major goal of ROCKING OUT.

I knew you had a good time.. but when you expect a 10, and you get a 6.. you do get disappointed.

Any road trip, with your brother and your buds, is bound to be great. I know that from experience.

Funny that you mentioned the seats’ proximity to everything. I thought the same thing. The parking was the best, too. I’d much rather walk a few more minutes than idle in the car for an hour of stop-and-go getting out of a parking lot.

Look at the reviews on this page on vhlinks.com, where you can choose concert-goers’ reviews from all the shows so far. For a very in-depth review of Van Halen in general and the KC concert (with bullet points at the end that are dead on), see this page.

1. Although I dreaded seeing our seats, I was thrilled with where we were. With that HUMONGOUS video screen behind the stage, you could see the band better than you could from anywhere behind the 20th row. In fact…maybe better, because the close-ups on the screen were crystal clear, and from too close you probably wouldn’t have been able to see it clearly.

2. We were 30 steps from the restroom, and 50 from beer, and didn’t have to step over anyone. No way it gets any better than that. Oh, and no one sat down for the entire concert either, which made it easy for people to pass by.

3. Parking, getting in, and getting out were a 10. Free, 3 blocks walk, and we never waited for a single car on the way out.

What I found myself the most intrigued with was Eddie’s son Wolfgang’s involvement. Here’s a kid who is 16 years old, and is playing bass guitar for one of the world’s most famous rock and roll bands to sold out arenas across the country. WOW. I bet the rush for Eddie has got to be amazing when he looks over and sees his son holding his own out there. There were a few times during the concert where they had a moment of playfulness, and laughed at each other. That was cool to see, and it reminded me that even though they seem larger than life, they’re just human beings with normal everyday emotions that are felt between a father and son. Pretty good stuff.

Mark, you and I are in direct agreement. It was great to get to see them play the old stuff, and just being able to hear the songs live was great. However, if I had to rate it with regard to overall sound quality vs. many other concerts I’ve been to, I would rank it pretty low. There were times when the backing vocals were great, and times when it seemed like they were borderline terrible.

I tried to keep it in perspective. I’ve been to Van Halen before when it was MUCH worse, and DLR could barely sing. At least this time, despite not even attempting his signature screams, he at least sang the right lyrics and mostly on pitch.

I’m not sure what was up with the sound board, but it all sounded a little muddy. I could tell early on, but it was VERY apparent at the end when they played “Jump” and the keyboard was played from a recording. It was MUCH clearer than the instruments. I would expect some difference in sound quality, but not that much. It made me wonder a little about Eddie’s “Old school” approach to recording, and his ideas about sound. I couldn’t BELIEVE he didn’t have a wireless in today’s day and age. I also thought it was strange that he had such a big guitar effect board, when most concerts of that size have sound engineers who can manage those, leaving one less thing to worry about for the performers.

It was HILARIOUS to me when Eddie pulled out his guitar cable during his solo section, licked it, and stuck it back in. I really hadn’t noticed any issues with the sound, and I thought it was more grandstanding than anything else. He was obviously trying to be funny when he did it…and it worked.

Although being critical is tough when it’s Eddie Van Halen, his solo left me with many of the same feelings I had the last time I saw them 4 years ago. He plays just enough of the melodies from the different solos to tease the audience, but not enough to really enjoy them. I’m sure he’s tired of playing them over and over, and consequently he changes them up. What it does for me is annoy me a little bit, because I like to hear at least enough of a representation to appreciate the high points. Instead, he just plays segments of the high points from many different solos.

I would MUCH rather hear him play “Cathedral” and “Eruption” in their entirety at different points during the show, rather than hearing snippets of 10 different solos all rammed together. But…that’s just a personal beef.

For show quality…I thought it was excellent. They played without any trivial breaks, and I thought the mix of songs was good. The lighting was nice, but not overdone. I thought “I’ll Wait” was out of character with the rest of the show, and despite being a big hit at the time, fell flat. My last nitpick is with “And the Cradle Will Rock.” I didn’t care at all for the background recording being played. Even though it might have sounded a bit thin, or required a little more ingenuity to make it sound interesting, I would have MUCH preferred them just playing it themselves.

Even with the nitpicking, I’ll go again if they fire up another tour in a few years. I just think their ability to mix hooks and melodies along with a raw punch is unmatched. They made hard rock melodic in a way that really hasn’t been duplicated, with a nod to Guns and Roses and Aerosmith for coming very close at times.

Besides…despite his popularity waning, Eddie Van Halen is a guitar innovator, and he should get more recognition for that. I still think his guitar tone is one of the best ever, and has never been effectively duplicated. He’s a legend…and every chance I have to see him is one I’ll probably take.

Yes, had we planned ahead we could have had breakfast or lunch the day we left. Oh well.

Although white creme filling is my favorite filling, my favorite donut is the sour cream donut. So, we think alike on that front.

I’ve got lots of kin out in Olathe. Actually, I owe a visit to some of them. Shame we didn’t plan ahead, could have met up for a meal or something.

Shan - Sorry to have bashed your white donut filling. My favorite donut is the sour cream batter ones so you can feel free to insult them. I promise to cry convincingly.

And I’m very glad you got to see a good concert…even if you won’t let me mock it. :(

Your reaction, though, sounds almost like you skipped the last three paragraphs, one of which begins, “We had a great time…”

I guess sometimes the negative is accentuated because it’s more interesting to write about the exceptions. Example: “I ate five meals without finding any foreign objects,” would be even more boring than anything already in this post, because everybody has eaten meals like that.

Shan - We both got to see great shows! What a weekend!