Phil Collins is opening his current tour with Against All Odds, a great song that yanks at my heart. But it’s not an opening song, in my opinion. A ballad, especially a heartbreaking song like Against All Odds shouldn’t be used to open a concert set.
On the 1987 tour, Genesis used Mama as an opening song which I don’t think worked well as an opener either. I know Genesis likes to use a song from the previous album as an opener but I think they should have gone with Land of Confusion which kicks ass live as shown on the We Can’t Dance tour.
I’ve never seen The Eagles live but I agree that’s a weird one. Hotel California seems like a better song as the last one in the regular set or perhaps the last one of the encore. Take it Easy seems like a much better Eagles openor.
Yeah, it can go either way with rock concerts. Most acts like a powerful, driving number, but some will start with a slow, moody one to build tension before laying into a hard rocker. But Hotel California is a bit odd, being sort of in between both ends of the scale. That feels more like a mid-set song to me, or possibly the first part of an encore. (I wouldn’t put it at the end of either set. I like concerts to end on up tempo tracks, personally.)
I’m having trouble thinking of a concert, though, where I thought the opener was really out of place. Like I said, I’m used to either moody down-tempo, or bright and uptempo as a set starter, and both are fine ways to start for me.
The first time that Adam Lambert toured the U.S. with Queen, in 2014, they opened the show with “Now I’m Here,” a song from “Sheer Heart Attack” that was never released as a single in the U.S. It’s a rocking song, and part of the reason they chose it, I think, was to note that Adam was now part of the band (as he sang “now I’m here”), but opening with a deep catalog song was an interesting choice.
Hotel California is probably still their most-recognizable song and they still* open with it. Take It Easy is probably their second most-recognizable song and they tend# to close with it. Already Gone is probably appropriate as an encore, but Life in the Fast Lane would set up false hopes, since everyone’s going to be waiting in gridlock just to get out of the parking lot. :smack:
–G!
*It’s the opener for their LIVE! album from 1980 and they were opening with it on the Farewell I tour.
#The Live album introduces it as the encore with “Here’s a song about the drive home” and the History of the Eagles tour closed with it by saying they were just bringing Bernie back on stage for one more. Hell Freezes Over introduces it as “Here’s how it all began…” and Jackson Browne (primary/co-writer) fittingly sat in for Glenn’s final closer.
Anderson, Bruford, Wakeman, Howe in 1989. The first half-hour of the concert was each member’s solos.
Anderson came out first, and did a medley of songs with just his voice and Jeff Berlin playing acoustic guitar. Then Howe came out and did “Clap” and “Mood for a Day.” Then Wakeman came out and did a selection of his solo stuff. And then, the band came out and did “Long Distance Runaround,” segueing into Bruford’s drum solo. After all that, the band played together for the rest of the show.
Maybe it’s got to do with the lyrics, like he saying “it’s a risk to try to jump start my career after all this time but here I am and I’m going for it”. Never one of my favorites if his but I would love to see him in concert again.
I too saw the '87 tour and I quite liked the *Mama *opening. Was that a “hit” at the time? As in, would someone who didn’t have the album know it?
In think it’s likely that someone in 1987 would have known Mama, it was in rotation on album rock stations in the 1980s as well as some MTV play in the early years. Someone who only knew the Invisible Touch album and No Jacket Required as a Phil solo album probably didn’t.
I haven’t read Phil’s Not Dead Yet book, but I know he’s been through relationship hell so I imagine that’s why he picked Against All Odds as the opener.
I remember the band Europe, and their one-hit wonder “The Final Countdown.” I saw a televised concert of theirs, at the height of their short lived popularity, and they not only OPENED the show with their mega-hit, they also CLOSED the show with the same song. They performed the same song twice in one concert.
One of my favorite bands, the Old 97s, traditionally close out their shows with the song “Timebomb”. A few years ago they had a tour for the 20th anniversary of their major label debut “Too Far To Care”, where the opening set was all of the songs from that album. “Timebomb” being the first song on the album meant they opened and closed the show with the same song.
I saw Bob Seger’s farewell tour this year. He opened with “Shakedown”. True it is his only #1 hit, but it is still not what I would consider an iconic Seger song.
Makes sense to me. I can imagine that just playing the opening notes will have the crowd going nuts. Good way to start a concert, even if the song itself is moody and midtempo.