The Time -- Fox Theatre, Stockton CA -- May 5

LAKESIDE
The opening act for The Time was Lakeside, and they were GREAT!! Better than The Time, IMHO. Their lead guitarist can really jam! And the lead singer was throwing his mic around and doing all kinds of funky dancing. I really enjoyed them. They ended their set with a 10-15 minute hard-funk jam of "Fantastic Voyage". Seriously, The Time should've opened for Lakeside bcuz Lakeside was on fire!!

THE TIME -- set list
Oak Tree (very short)
Jerk Out (very short)
Get It Up -- approx 4mins
Cool -- full version
777-9311 -- led into kind of an extended jam
Gigolos Get Lonely Too -- 4 min singalong
Ice Cream Castles -- approx 7 mins
The Walk -- approx 5 mins
The Bird -- approx 5 mins
Jungle Love -- approx 4 mins

Most people sang along to "Get It Up" & "Cool". During "Cool" the audience did sign language on the chorus. "C - O - O - L What's that spell?" and then they did the chant at the end of the song. And "777-9311" was good, as always -- but nothing new here.

The highlight of the show, for me, was the "Gigolos Get Lonely Too" singalong. Jerome introduced it as a song that probably no one remembers, remarking that some people in the audience weren't even in school (or born) when the song came out. He said, "If you know the words, sing along... if not, who cares? Just pretend anyway. It's cool." Surprising enough, most everyone knew every line to that song! That made it fun.

Then Jerome went out into the audience and picked out a dozen or more very fine looking girls and put them on the stage. This whole part lasted about 20 minutes and consisted of mostly Jerome and Morris going ga-ga over these ladies' bodies. I thought it was stupid. The background music they used while finding the girls sounded like "Donald Trump (Black Version)" if it was anything at all.

This segment also included the song "Ice Cream Castles" with the "Let's do something... Let's do something soon" part used as background to the girls dancing and showing off their ass-ets.

As you can see, they only performed their single releases from 1981-1984. And they performed everything almost EXACTLY the same way as on the albums. Even the "ad libs" were the same. No improvisations or show of musicianship! I was hoping they'd play several new songs, and maybe even "Murph Drag" -- but no!

The current Time members include: Morris Day (vocals), Jerome Benton (percussion & sidekick), Jellybean (drums), Monte Moir (keys), some guy on bass, some guy on lead guitar (from a band called FreakJuice -- info on Internet?), and some other guy.

The guy playing lead was pretty good, and he did a good job copying Jesse's style; however, he didn't seem to go beyond that, except in one point during the show where he was making love to ladies on the stage with his guitar. He made his guitar sound like it was going through the various stages of sexual stimulation and release. He rubbed it up against one girl's chest, and she ran away. But then he really got into with another girl... rubbing it ALL over her body. Morris & Jerome were all over the ladies. Checking them up and down. Staring at their backsides, touching them, all kinds of nasty things. I just wasn't into it. What happened to the music? It seemed they were using the show as a way for themselves to get off. I was really disappointed.

Morris & Jerome did some great dance moves, but it's still the same as before. The songs are still the same as before, even the way they play them. Nothing new here. It was kind of sad. It would be like watching Prince 20 years later still dressing up in Edwardian ruffles and performing ONLY Purple Rain songs the same exact way they sound on that 20 year old record.

One of the biggest let-downs of the evening, for me, was finding out that Jesse Johnson wasn't with them. Wise choice, Jesse!

All in all, the show was fun, but it didn't give any hint of a future Time project, and their musicianship left a lot to be desired. Funny thing is... most of these songs were either written or co-written by Prince. I think it's about time that The Time show they are worthy enough on their own. They didn't show it tonight.