Not even the futuristic graphics, confetti cannons or firework-shooting guitars may overshadow Queen’s decades-long physique of traditional songs.
Members of the band Queen introduced their Rhapsody Tour to the Bridgestone Area stage Wednesday night time armed with sequins, confetti cannons, digital robots, pyrotechnics, disco balls and a deep catalog of large hits spanning 40-plus years.
It is exhausting to consider generation-spanning anthems like “We Are the Champions” and “We Will Rock You” have been launched in 1977.
However unique Queen members, guitarist Brian Might and drummer Roger Taylor, joined by adopted frontman Adam Lambert, confirmed the packed home at Bridgestone they’ve nonetheless bought it.
With no opening act on this tour, Queen set the stage and have become their very own warm-up act with pulsing music and an occasional guitar strum or drum beat to get the group prepared. At about 8:15 p.m., the programmed music steadily bought just a little louder as home lights bought just a little dimmer.
At 8:17 p.m., Bridgestone Area went darkish. The gang went nuts. The animated robots crawled throughout the display screen in a graphic presentation that will have made Instrument proud.
Then in an explosive second, Lambert stepped on stage in sparkly silver platform boots topped with platinum blond hair because the band ripped into “Radio Ga Ga.”
The band effortlessly rolled by mega hit after mega hit, from “One other One Bites the Mud” to “Killer Queen”
Lambert, who has been touring with Queen for a decade, is each bit the flamboyant frontman with the unparalleled vocals that Queen’s unique frontman, Freddie Mercury, was solely with just a little extra make-up and some extra sequins.
Whereas he danced round amid a number of wardrobe adjustments all through the present, Lambert managed to face within the highlight with out stealing it.
“I have been touring with these guys for over 10 years now and each time I placed on an enormous ol’ heel and just a little glitter on my cheek, I’ve Freddie Mercury in my coronary heart,” Lambert informed the group. “Let’s maintain this occasion going for him.”
The 2-hour-plus live performance was equal elements rock present and Broadway manufacturing — with Lambert’s animated antics and big-production vocals — together with a splash of Vegas thrown in to present it just a little further sparkle.
However regardless of the glitter and glam, the center of the present was Might’s stellar guitar taking part in, Taylor’s talent behind the drum equipment and the palpable respect for the 50 years the 2 have been making music and performing collectively.
There have been moments within the present the place every member got here to the tip of a protracted catwalk and carried out extra stripped-down songs. One spotlight was Might’s solo on a stool for a touching efficiency of “Love of My Life.” Might observed a number of cellphone flashlights scattered throughout the world and requested the group to gentle the place up, which it did.
The music completed with a video of Mercury singing the tip of the music earlier than he turned and walked into the darkness in a really poignant second.
However the crescendo got here at about two hours in when Lambert sang the all-too-familiar “Is that this the actual life? Is that this simply fantasy?” intro to “Bohemian Rhapsody.”
Because the music kicked in, Might, who had ditched his demure black denims and Adidas sneakers, ascended from beneath the stage sporting a disco-ball outfit that rivaled Lambert’s. The band complemented the reside efficiency with sections of the music’s unique music video exhibiting simply the bandmember’s faces.
The band would go away the stage, but it surely solely took a couple of minutes for the group to start out stomping out that well-known “We Will Rock You” beat. It wasn’t lengthy earlier than, as if on cue, Mercury appeared on display screen within the banana yellow jacket and white pants, main the group in his legendary call-out “Ay-Oh.”
The present wrapped with blistering renditions of “We Will Rock You” and “We Are the Champions,” wherein Might presumably foreshadowed some hockey success in Nashville’s future, donning a Predators jersey as he sang “We’re the champions, my buddy.”
Queen + Adam Lambert at Bridgestone Area set listing
“Radio Ga Ga”
“Hammer to Fall”
“One other One Bites the Mud”
“I am in Love with My Automobile”
“Bicycle Race”
“Fats Bottomed Ladies”
“I Need It All”
“A Form of Magic”
“Killer Queen”
“Do not Cease Me Now”
“Any individual To Love”
“Love of My Life”
“’39”
“Below Strain”
“Tie Your Mom Down”
“Loopy Little Factor Known as Love”
“I Need To Break Free”
“Who Desires to Stay Without end”
“Is This the World We Created”
“The Present Should Go On”
“Bohemian Rhapsody”
“We Will Rock You”
“We Are the Champions”
Melonee Damage covers music and music enterprise at The Tennessean, a part of the USA TODAY NETWORK — Tennessee. Attain Melonee at mhurt@tennessean.com or on X @HurtMelonee.
