When I saw on Stingus.net that Sting would be playing a show for American Express card members on February 19th in Newark, 30 minutes from my house, I thought it was the perfect birthday present for my wife Andrea whose birthday is the next day. This show was a little harder to get into than just buying tickets on ticketmaster with your Amex card though. It turns out that the show was “by invitation only” for American Express Centurion card members. I don’t know too many Sting fans with an American Express black card…

 

I was able to get two great seats, 8th row center aisle, from Craiglist. I totally surprised Andrea – she didn’t know who we were seeing until we walked into the venue. She said she never thought I could surprise her with a Sting show! But since this wasn’t advertized at all, she knew nothing about it. And neither did I until Holly’s post two days ago. I was expecting a Symphonicity show and was extremely pleasantly surprised to learn that Vinnie and David Sancious were back.

 

Ok, so a little bit of a rant here. This was a private show for people with a LOT of money who are not necessarily Sting fans but got complimentary tickets to an exclusive Sting show with complimentary food and drinks. And what does Sting do? He reunites what is in his words from Saturday, his “FAVORITE BAND.” And he gives the audience an eclectic setlist on top of that. And aside from recognizing the hits, 99% of the audience has no real appreciation for the coolness factor of Vinnie and David being there or gems like Seven Days being dusted off. Why cater to THIS audience? There were isolated pockets of fans in the audience who were out of their seats for most of the show, but the rest of the audience just sat politely…

 

Anyway, this was a great ROCK show, the likes of which I was starting to doubt we’d ever see from Sting after the lute album, the winter album, and the symphony album. Some songs were given new life, like a bluesy arrangement of Set Them Free, and Hounds of Winter which really shined with Jo Lawry on vocals. The show was heavy on Police songs and Ten Summoner’s Tales and Mercury Falling. There was not a single song from The Soul Cages, Brand New Day or Sacred Love. A little disappointing since this was the reunited Soul Cages band L  

 

Here’s the setlist:

 

If I Ever Lose My Faith
Message In A Bottle
Englishman in New York
Synchronicity II
Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic
When We Dance
I'm So Happy I Can't Stop Crying
I Hung My Head
Fields Of Gold
If You Love Somebody
Hound of Winter
Driven To Tears
Shape Of My Heart
Seven Days
Heavy Cloud, No Rain
Wrapped Around Your Finger
Bring On The Night/When The World Is Running Down
Roxanne
King Of Pain
Every Breath You Take
Next To You

 

The other nice thing about this show – it made me feel like it was ’96 and I was 21 again! ;-)

 


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