Bryan Adams
Bare Bones Tour
Rochester Auditorium Theatre
Rochester, NY
January 21, 2012
By Joseph Suto
Bryan Adams returned to Rochester for his “Bare Bones” tour Saturday evening. The last time we caught Mr. Adams was at his 2005 appearance at Frontier Field along with Def Leppard. Two different types of shows one electric and this one tonight an all acoustic set. The acoustic show makes for quite an intimate experience and gives fans a chance to see an artist in a different light. The crowd of 2,100 were treated to a fantastic show by one of the greatest songwriters of their time.
Other than having pianist Gary Breit accompany him on several of the songs to help enhance them, it was just Bryan, a guitar and on a few tracks a harmonica. The stripped down show began with “Run To You” followed by “It’s Only Love”, two gems from his best selling album Reckless. That certainly got the crowds attention and set the tone for the show. Bryan told the audience that they would hear songs they know, songs they don’t know and songs they never want to know, showing his comedic side.
Bryan said how good it was to be back in the Northeast. He fondly recalled Albany, Syracuse, Rochester and Buffalo as the areas of the States where he first broke as special to him and how from there he spread like a virus to the rest of the USA. He then dedicated the song that started it all for him “Lonely Nights” to the appreciative audience.
The acoustic format provides a good look into how some of the songs came into existence as Bryan had mentioned several of these songs were written on acoustic guitar. It also gave us a look at some his songs in a new perspective. Case in point the version of “Heat Of The Night”, which appeared to be more uptempo than the original version culled from his 1987 release Into The Fire. The crowd came alive as “Summer Of ’69” brought the majority out of their seats for the first time of the night. Bryan told a story about how people remember him opening for Journey back in the day. So he did a snippet of the Journey song “Lights” just before breaking into “Cuts Like A Knife”.
As Bryan closed out the show with gem “Straight From The Heart”, one could not help but notice the strong connection he has with his fans. Although it has been quite some time since he last dented the US singles charts, the crowd showed how much they appreciate him and Bryan confirmed the bond as he sang the lyric “You know I’ll never go, as long as I know, It’s comin’ straight from the heart.”
Set List
Run to You
It’s Only Love
Back to You
Here I Am
I’m Ready
This Time
Flying
Do I Have to Say the Words
Can’t Stop This Thing We Started
Lonely Nights
Heat of the Night
Not Romeo Not Juliet
(Everything I Do) I Do It for You
Cuts Like a Knife
Please Forgive Me
Summer of ’69
Walk on By
Heaven
The Right Place
The Only Thing That Looks Good on Me Is You
Encore
Somebody
You’ve Been a Friend to Me
Have You Ever Really Loved a Woman?
Miss You a Little Bit
Straight from the Heart
Special Thanks to Nina Kolb and Kim Estlund for allowing us to review this great show!
