one4u2 said:
I like Bon Jovi
i actually had fun (and, not coincidentally, the stage was a near-exact replica of the Bada-Bing)
it took me a bit to get into it -- they started out playing "one wild night," which was some crappy song that was popular in Belgium, and then they played "it's my life" which isn't disagreeable.
then Jon said something like, "let's really get it started," at which point there was a big dramatic pause, and then at an earsplitting decible, the following words blasted out the PA and into the very souls of the 50,000 sweaty Belgians (and me and the English chicks):
SHOT THROUGH THE HEART
AND YOU'RE TO BLAME!
DARLING,
YOU GIVE LOVE
A BAD NAME
after about 15 seconds, i started to laugh. uncontrollably. tears were streaming down my cheeks. i remembered sitting on the bus in 2nd grade with my A-Team lunchbox and massive cassette player complete with foam earphones listening to a cassette that the kid across the street had made for me from his older brother's album.
i thought it was "bad," at the time, so i remember keeping the volume low, so that the "bad" sounds wouldn't reach the ears of any suspecting parents or teachers.
(and i had no idea just what was going on at the beginning of "Social Disease" ... i think my next door neighbor said, "they're screwing," and i couldn't figure out what cabinet or shelving would make such a noise ... but then i was a kid who used to walk around singing "like a version, hey! touched for the very first time")
oh, the concert. yeah, it took me most of the rest of the song to stop laughing, and then, being rather ballsy, they brought out "living on a prayer." 4th song of the set. imagine U2 playing "streets" 4th song into the set.
good for them.
the fourth encore was "i'll be there for you" and we, the audience, were truly there for each other, hands aloft, some of them clasped, faces to the dreary northern european skies and it had just started pissing rain (it was, like, freaking july and barely 60 degrees out) and we sang our hearts out.
and i started to laugh. again.