1985

The weather had become pretty bad outside, with a freezing rain storm building most of the afternoon. Cincinnati is not a city well prepared for winter weather. Fortunately, my friends and I lived within walking distance of the venue and we were able to attend. The place was mostly empty, as other fans were shut in from the ice. I had purchased their debut album, so I was already familiar with the set list. These guys rocked! We were up at the front of the stage, shared our pitchers of beer with the band and had a great time. My friend Steve won a contest to get a copy of the album signed by all members of the band. Due to a planning error, they had no copies of the album on hand and the manager agreed to have MCA send him 5 or 6 new albums by mail, none by the band Autograph though.

SETLIST
Send Her To Me
Thrill Of Love
Cloud 10
Friday
Deep End
My Girlfriends Boyfriend Isnt Me
Turn Up The Radio
Take No Prisoners
Crazy World

MEET & GREET: Autograph (Steve Plunkett, Randy Rand, Steve Lynch, Keni Richards, Steve Isham)

AUTOGRAPH

This was a reunion of sorts bringing back the classic line up of Deep Purple and signaling the end of Rainbow. Perfect Strangers was a solid album with plenty of heavy riffs and the band delivered a hits driven set list with polish and style. This was the first time I had seen a liquid light show, which was an appropriate backdrop to the classic, Child In Time. The set also included one of my all time favorite DP tracks, Lazy. Here's a nice twist to the evening as well: My best friend from high school came to visit me during his college spring break, which was offset from my spring break. He brought along a little extra in the party supplies category, so we were pretty well lit on hash the whole time he was there. We got ready (so to speak) to drive out to the venue for this show and I was being especially careful driving, as I always do while stoned. We approached an exit ramp which went down a slope and curved to a stop light at the bottome of the hill. As we descended the slope, I applied the brake and found that my brake light came on and we were not slowing down. At the bottom of the ramp waiting was a red traffic light and a few stopped cars ahead of us. I flipped out and di d the only thing an irrationally stoned drive could do, pump wildly on the brake pedal! That worked. Somehow we managed to get through the traffic to the venue and parked in a gravel lot. I fully expected to leave the show and find my master cylinder drained of fluid, but not so. I got in the car, started the engine and no warning lights. We drove home without incident and the brakes worked just fine.

SETLIST:
Highway Star
Nobody's Home
Strange Kind Of Woman
A Gypsy's Kiss
Perfect Strangers
Under The Gun
Lazy
Child In Time
Knocking On Your Back Door
Difficult To Cure
Space Truckin'

ENCORE:
Smoke On The Water

DEEP PURPLE
GIRLSCHOOL

My second time to see the Animalize tour - same show, different city. Always loud and entertaining.

Blackie Lawless and WASP were kind of a below par group to open a Kiss concert, I thought. I didn't really enjoy their image, because by this time, it was who could appear to be more demonic than Ozzy or Dio. That schtick seemed to be already dominated and there didn't seem to me that there was much room for more of that theme. It seemed beyond perverted for obvious reasons and they just appeared to have a real limited life span to me. However, I liked some of the WASP music and still do to this day. I just think they could have gone farther without their chosen image. I recall they were tossing out posters from the stage (rolled) and Blackie gestured jerking off with them before sending them into the audience to some lucky fan. I can't imagine Gene Simmons allowing a support act to give away something these days.

KISS SETLIST:
Detroit Rock City
Cold Gin
Creatures Of The Night
Fits Like A Glove
Heaven's On Fire
Under The Gu
War Machine
Drum Solo
Young And Wasted
I Love It Loud
I Still Love You
Love Gun
Black Diamond
Oh Susannah
Lick It Up

ENCORE:
Rock And Roll All Nite

W.A.S.P. SETLIST
On Your Knees
The Flame
L.O.V.E. Machine
Sleeping In The Fire
School Daze
Animal F**k Like A Beast
I Wanna Be Somebody

KISS
W.A.S.P.

Same Sammy Hagar tour, different venue, not much different than last time, but again an exciting show! The interesting story here is the support act Dokken, who were extremely impressive this time. Tooth and Nail was a strong album featuring some solid radio singles. This was an exceptionally good bill.

SAMMY HAGAR SETLIST:
Bad Motor Scooter
Love Or Money
I Don't Need Love
Three Lock Box
Baby's On Fire
Two Sides Of Love
I Cant Drive 55
Your Love Is Driving Me Crazy
I'll Fall In Love Again
Swept Away
Remember The Heroes
The Girl Gets Around
Fast Times At Ridgemont High
Heavy Metal
VOA
There's Only One Way To Rock

ENCORE:
Dick In The Dirt
Red
Rock And Roll

DOKKEN SETLIST:
Without Warning
Tooth And NAil
When Heaven Comes Down
Don't Close Your Eyes
Just Got Lucky
Alone Again
Bullets To Spare

ENCORE:
Breaking The Chains

SAMMY HAGAR
DOKKEN

A very talented young lady who could rock with the best, but didn't really catch fire in many ways. If you mention Fiona today, people immediately assume you're talking Fiona Apple. Not so. Fiona Flannagan was her name and she gave a solid show at Bogart's. Her style was tenacious and tough. She reminded me a lot of a young Pat Benatar. Fiona would end up doing a duet with Kip Winger later on, but that was about the end of her career as a rock starlet.

FIONA SETLIST:
One Wild Night
You're No Angel
James
Keeper of the Flame
No More Broken Dreams
Heaven on my Mind
Talk to Me
Na Na Song
Rescue You
Hang Your Heart on Me

ENCORE:
Line of Fire

MEET & GREET: Fiona

FIONA

Even shorter lived success than Fiona was Flash Kahan, another free show at Bogart's. They had one radio single called One At A Time which wasn't a bad song. If you bought that album expecting to hear other songs with a similar style, you would have been surprised to find some doo-wop pop. They weren't that great as evidenced by the fact that this was their first, last and only album together.

FLASH KAHAN

Hands down, best show I've ever seen. A lot of personal notes can be added about this concert. We were living in Cincinnati at the time. Through my friend Andy, I had become a Dire Straits fan only a year before Brothers In Arms was released. For us, this was a much anticipated album. We had played the older stuff over and over and we were eager to hear something new. We heard that Dire Straits would play Blossom Music Center near Cleveland and made arrangements to get lawn tickets. Of course, Money For Nothing was a successful radio single and it revolutionized MTV, but to the best of my recollection, the album had not yet become the worldwide blockbuster that everyone remembers. The drive from Cincinnati to Cleveland is along one, seven hours I think. Four of us were going and we spent the weekend at Rob's mother's condo in Bratenahl. Because Rob was going to remain in Cleveland for another week or so, we took two cars. I rode with Rob and his golden retriever, Newton. Rob drove an old blue Pinto, the dog was plenty large enough for the back seat and the three of us made unusual traveling companions at best. Campbell rode in Andy's car. The weekend was infamously memorable for two primary reasons. One, Andy had been in a real shitty mood leading up to the concert and wasn't really getting along with Rob. Two, it had been pouring down rain for a few days leading up to the concert. We spent Saturday in Coventree going to music stores and the like. It was still raining that day. We decided to stop off at a hardware store and get a roll of Vizqueen plastic and some ponchos. Driving from Bratenahl to Cuyahoga was miserable. Rob and Andy argued about directions. The concert parking lot was a farm pasture near the amphitheater. I probably need not mention that the field was muddy. By the time we approached the gate, the rain was really coming down. The lawn area of Blossom Music Center has a large steep grade and with all the rain, it was nothing short of a mud slide. We unrolled some plastic, sat on it and pulled the roll up over ourselves like a tent. We grabbed a couple of sticks to support the roof. Despite all of that, easily the most miserable of conditions for any concert, Dire Straits was by far one of the all time best concerts I have ever seen. With no support act, Mark Knopfler and company rolled through a lot of the new material, plus a majority of songs featured on the live album, Alchemy. For nearly three hours, they played to rain soaked fans who stayed through the entire show. The ride back to Bratenahl was equally as enjoyable as the ride there.

SETLIST:
Ride Across The River
Expresso Love
One World
Romeo And Juliet
Private Investigations
Sultans of Swing
Why Worry
Walk Of Life
Two Young Lovers
Money For Nothing
Wild West End
Tunnel Of Love
Brothers In Arms
Solid Rock
Going Home: Theme From Local Hero

DIRE STRAITS

The interesting thing about this concert was that Jim Kale was the only original member of the band, augmented by other musicians: Dale Russell, Sonnie Bernardi, Mike Hanford and Bob Fuhr. The show was especially miserable for me, as I was contending with a bad sinus infection that must have hit its zenith that night. We sat in the balcony section, which was particularly hot and smoky. Combined with a fever, it wasn't much fun. Never the less, this was sort of the height of my renewed fascination with The Guess Who. I had been playing their records on my fire escape, which I was using as a balcony all summer.

GUESS WHO

One of the more obscure concerts that I have ever attended, Bill Bruford and Patrick Moraz were being billed as both former members of Yes. The on-air commercials ran background music of Roundabout and other Yes classics. This turned out to be the second effort by the duo, which bore no resemblance to Yes whatsoever. It was originally called Music For Piano and Drums and that is exactly what it was. Their then current album was called Flags, which was perhaps slightly more commercial than their debut album. Nevertheless, both were more than accomplished musicians and presented a very enjoyable and extraordinary evening of music.

PATRICK MORAZ and BILL BRUFORD

I had been set up on a blind date for this concert and things couldn't have gone worse. My friends Bill and Kirsten were practically engaged. Bill was a Herron student with me in Indianapolis, Kirsten was a student at Purdue. She planned to bring a girlfriend to the concert, so it was established that we would go as couples. I don't remember the girl's name, but I do remember she was not a happy camper, resentful of most everything. I can't recall how many nights Mellencamp sold out at Market Square Arena that year, but it was a lot. It seemed as though they could schedule a month's worth of shows and there would be people there to see him.

SETLIST:
Small Town
Jack & Diane
Minutes to Memories
Lonely Ol' Night
Rain on the Scarecrow
Between a Laugh and a Tear
Hand to Hold on To
Rumbleseat
Golden Gates
Ain't Even Done with the Night
Crumblin' Down
R.O.C.K. in the U.S.A.
Play Guitar
Hurts So Good
Authority Song
The Face of the Nation
Pink Houses
Mickey's Monkey (Miracles cover)
Mony Mony (Tommy James & the Shondells cover)
Nobody but Me (The Human Beinz cover)
Proud Mary (Creedence Clearwater Revival cover)
Under the Boardwalk (The Drifters cover)

JOHN MELLENCAMP