;)
Dear Ric Ocasek,
For the first time in decades, I miss you more than your wife. Really. You were always that weird gawky guy with the pasty face, hiding behind the black Ray-Bans. Paulina Porizkova, on the other hand, was a supermodel from Czechoslovakia who made Sports Illustrated worth buying, once a year, every spring.
But, Tuesday night at the Wells Fargo Center, while sitting in a half-empty room watching the New Cars - a tribute band that races through your songs faster than karaoke night - I wished you'd been there. To hop on stage, yes, but also to laugh at all the right moments.
Like Todd Rundgren. He plays you. If you said "danke schoen" after every song. And made jokes about the New Cars and New Coke. And sang "Bang the Drum All Day."
Some bass player who looks like Scott Baio stands in for the late Benjamin Orr, awkwardly auditioning for the right to sing "Drive." Guitarist Elliott Easton is so happy to be on stage again, he occasionally goes off on crazy 10-minute guitar solos, like on "You're All I've Got Tonight," until everyone except faithful drummer Prairie Prince (remember him from the Tubes?) just quits playing and watches.
Like any good wedding band, they get into it. Don't get me wrong. And they love playing loud. And the one "new" original song, a slow ballad called "Warm," is god awful.
But you probably know all this. When they asked you to hit the road, you refused. With only two original members in the band - Easton on guitar and Greg Hawkes on keyboards - they came up with the New Cars. Odds are, it was gonna suck. But don't forget, after Bon Scott died, AC/DC pulled off the greatest resurrection ever. INXS, Journey, Judas Priest and The Doors, not so much.
Not that the Cars were a great live band to begin with. You always hated the road and it showed all over your face. MTV was another story. Like Joey Ramone in a mullet and a skinny tie, you were the '80s New Wave video posterboy.
Now you're kicking it at home with the wife and kids. I just thought you should know how sorely missed you are. The New Cars know the words to all the songs, like any honest bar band. But that's about it. It's probably why less than 600 people bought tickets. Not even half the amount Gordon Lightfoot sold earlier this year. Now there's a name you don't hear much anymore. Oh well, tell your wife I said, hi. And maybe check out Gordon Lightfoot some time.
Merry Christmas,
Sadsack '80s Castaway in Santa Rosa
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Posted By: Do_Not_Test_Drive_The_New_Cars (22/12/2006 1:24:21 PM)
Comment: Linda, Linda, Linda, I'm not going to get into the musicianship issues here, but consider this, the band cancelled dates all over the country. San Francisco was apparently the only date not related to sales as the band got stuck in Reno. Obviously you must live under a car. This show was so heavily advertised, not only on the bands website, but the bands myspace page, the theaters my space page, through the theaters website and emails, through tickets.com, 97 7 The River, Mix 104.9, KOZT the Coast, The Press Democrat, The Bohemian, through VH-1 Classics, and on and on. They sold less than 600 tickets and gave the balance away. I'm sure it was painful for the Theater. Now, when The New Cars played Konocti earlier this year with Blondie, clearly the nearly 2000 fans there were there to hear "Heart of Glass" not "Drive." Clearly Sonoma County did not want to test "drive" The New Cars, except for perhaps the loyal SoCo Rungren fans.
Posted By: Linda (14/12/2006 10:05:54 PM)
Comment: Dear Sadsack '80s Castaway in Santa Rosa,
You obviously did not do your homework. The New Cars are just that, New. As they've said in interviews, they are not trying to copy what they did in the 70's and 80's, but to put a new twist on it, and bring some new material to their fans. What were you expecting, knowing that only 2 original members were in the band? I'll admit, I had reservations that only Elliot Easton and Greg Hawkes were involved, but after reading about, and hearing, their enthusiasm for this 'project' I decided to give them a chance. It's not the same, by a long shot, but I enjoyed the concert very much, and it was great to see Easton and Hawkes on stage together again.
Todd Rundgren is not Ric Ocasek, and he doesn't try to be (apparently you've never seen Ocasek live or you would not think the 2 are anything alike). Rundgren is quite the character, as I witnessed for myself on Tuesday night, after hearing it from many people. As for Elliot Easton being "so happy to be on stage again", he has been playing in bands on stage and in the studio since the original Cars broke up, so I'm not sure what you meant by that, other than he was happy to get to play again after being injured all summer, but you made it sound like he's done nothing all these years. And he only had one extended solo, not the many you made it sound like he played.
I do agree that the weakest part was Kasim Sultan's very poor version of Drive. Although he is a decent bass player, his voice works for the back up stuff and maybe other songs, but it's not strong, or deep enough to pull off Drive.
I also agree that it was unfortunate that the show was not sold out, but from what I could tell, only the balcony was empty. The main floor was packed. Plus, the only way I found out about the show was the New Cars website. I did not see or hear of any advertising, so the smaller crowd was understandable. And no matter the size of the crowd, everyone there seemed very enthusiastic about what they were seeing and hearing. It's not often that so many people jump to their feet cheering after most every song played at a concert, but that happened Tuesday night. I guess you missed that part.
Linda
Posted By: Loric (14/12/2006 7:13:39 AM)
Comment: Oh what a drag....Todd Rundgren used to be so good. Didn't even know he was doing this.
Posted By: Sonoma/Tony (13/12/2006 11:00:41 PM)
Comment: I enjoyed the show for the fact that Elliot Easton and Mr. Hawkes enjoyed being back . And i wanted that to happen. I saw Elliot at Petaluma with Credence and he did a awesome job even played some cars riffs in some of thier songs.He loved and watch us in the small crowd enjoy what he was doing. And yes the most disapointing thing to me was when Drive played and the bass player was trying to reach puiperty. I would have rather seen a tape of the late great Ben Orr pop down during the live concert. By the way which Mr. Rungren played a great guitar on. And I enjoyed his music also. Being that as it may Mr. Easton was injured in the bus crash which put of their tour and made it possible for us to see them in s.r. I am thankful this xmas too see what we could. And god bless the 80'S. Tony B. Sonoma
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