“Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.”
—Dylan Thomas
An energetic 76-year-old Rick Springfield commanded the SoundStage at Graceland
Thursday night, September 18, before 2500 appreciative Gen-Xers. The unbridled enthusiasm of a grateful audience for their favored artist manifested the essence of rock music during this show. This captive audience stood the entire show, singing every word to every song that they had known by heart for 40 years.
Springfield has a history that readily provides him with the nostalgic radioactivity to deliver a high-energy, memory-provoking performance that never lags. Springfield has honed his performance into a seamless 90 minutes of the 1980s. This show omits the singer’s blues jag while scaling back the sentimental autobiographical content. Springfield’s catalog is so large that he addresses and third of it in a concert medley that spanned his career while tipping his hat to Eddie Money (“Two Tickets to Paradise”). Elsewhere, the singer weaves in a verse from Black Sabbath’s “Paranoid.”
Springfield always presents a fine show, but few this lean and taut. His production and pacing are purely professional. The show’s highlight was a lengthy guitar introduction, showing off Springfield’s significant talent before striking the opening chords to “Jailhouse Rock,” the homage to The King on his turf. Springfield’s greatest pop achievement, “Jessie’s Girl,” was the encore, with Springfield returning to the stage within a carefully orchestrated multimedia introduction, shirtless, to sing the most literate lines in rock music:
“You know I feel so dirty / When they start talking cute
I wanna tell her that I love her / But the point is probably moot…”
That “good night?” Just not quite yet.
Setlist
I’ll Make You Happy; Affair of the Heart; I’ve Done Everything for You; medley: Living in Oz / Bop 'Til You Drop / Souls / Two Tickets to Paradise / Jessie's Girl / What's Victoria's Secret? / What Kind of Fool Am I / Rock of Life; Jailhouse Rock; Love Is Alright Tonight; World Start Turning; I Get Excited, Don’t Talk to Strangers; Love Somebody; Human Touch; Jessie’s Girl.
Musicians
Rick Springfield: vocals, guitar; George Bernhardt: guitar; Jorge Palacious: drums; Sigve "Siggy" Sjurse: bass; Tim Gross: keyboards, guitars.
