Just got back from the Cleveland show, and feelin' funky!
First things first, the setlist:
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Uptown
Controversy
Mutiny
Cream
Little Red Corvette
I Wanna Be Your Lover
Sexy Dancer
Housequake
Ballad of Dorothy Parker
I Could Never Take the Place of Your Man
Do Me, Baby/Scandalous/Diamonds and Pearls
Beautiful Ones
Nothing Compares 2 U
Let's Go Crazy
Take Me With U/Raspberry Beret
Darling Nikki
When Doves Cry/Father's Song/Computer Blue/I Would Die 4 U/Baby I'm a Star/God (inst)
Purple Rain
When Will We Be Paid
She's Always in My Hair
U Got the Look
Kiss
Gett Off/Give Up the Funk/Push it Up
Come On/Push it Up
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First off, this band is a vast improvement over the JOTY band. Najee, while
featured a bit too much imo, is an excellent sax man, and the drummer blows
Ka'J away. I wish P could get away from hacking songs to bits in a medley
style--especially the Purple Rain medley, which had one chorus of Doves
(which I think was sampled anyway), one line from Comp. Blue, I would Die
and Baby I'm a Star---what's the point? But he did play a full PR, and
Najee doing God/Father's Song sounded great. Highlights--Darling Nikki-what
you've heard about the current version is true--it ROCKS, very much like the
album version, he did the whole thing, and didn't censor any of the lyrics! That was my favorite part of the show...Until during Gett Off when who shows
up in a Kings robe but the one, the only, George Clinton! George basically
worked up the crowd into chants from Give Up the Funk and Atomic Dog, and
everybody went nuts. Very cool treat indeed. Note the absence of the
Santana medley, maybe just because of time constraints, having GC etc.
Houselights came on as soon as Come On ended, and the announcement for the
afterparty was made. The only other show I've seen was JOTY in Pittsburgh,
and I'm having a tough time deciding which was better. I would have liked a
little less of a hits package and some rarer cuts, even some of the new
stuff. But I certainly have no regrets, and it was worth the $50.