Weekend arts forecast: Feels like the last time
Foreigner was (and is) the British/American group that tore up the 1970s and ‘80s FM airwaves – and the record charts – with “Feels Like the First Time,” “Hot Blooded,” “Urgent,” “Cold as Ice,” “Dirty White Boy,” “Double Vision” and the power ballads “Waiting For a Girl Like You” and “I Want to Know What Love Is” (that last one went to No. 1 in 1984).
More than 80 million albums sold.
When does a legacy rock band become a brand? Foreigner’s name (and logo) are owned by founding guitarist and songwriter Mick Jones, who no longer tours with the band and so won’t be at the July 9 show at the Mid-Florida Credit Union Amphitheater. Neither will Lou Gramm, the distinctive voice on all those Foreigner hits – he left, for the last time, in 2003.
In fact, this concert – part of what’s being billed as Foreigner’s “Farewell Tour” – will include zero founding Foreigners. (It should be noted that many members of the “original” band, including Jones and Gramm, reunited briefly in 2018 for a couple of 40th anniversary shows.)
The songs, of course, still rock and rock hard.
Kelly Hansen has been the lead singer with this version of Foreigner since 2005. After 17 years, he recently told an interviewer, “it’s gotten tougher and tougher every year to sing this great catalog of songs. And it maybe sounds like I’m whining. I’m not trying to whine; I’m really fortunate to be able to have done this and do this with the band.
“It’s just I don’t wanna sacrifice the quality of these songs and the performance of these songs. So I think it’s better to say, ‘You know what? I’m gonna leave here strong and let the memory of this live thing be strong as well.”
Bassist Jeff Pilson (class of ’04) recently said that Jones’ health issues caused him to bow out, and teased that the architect of Foreigner’s sound might make a stage appearance or two during this last tour. “He’s great,” Pilson told Kiki Classic Rock. “He’ll do some shows here and there. It’s impossible to predict the regularity of it, but, yeah, he’ll come in.
“And he’s doing great. He’s happy, he’s healthy. He’s excited about the fact that the band is kind of writing its last chapter as we speak, or at least its last live chapter.”
Polk County’s Frostproof High School choir will open the concert with a classic rock medley, followed by a set by the 1980s band Loverboy.
Tickets are here.
More music
Jazz pianist Zachary Bartholomew, along with Marty Quinn (bass) and drummer Rodolfo Zuniga, play the music of legends Thelonious Monk and Bud Powell tonight in the Side Door Café, downstairs at the Palladium Theater. Tickets for The High Priests of Bebop are here.
Friday and Saturday delivers country music’s Luke Combs to Raymond James Stadium, along with Riley Green, Lainey Wilson and others. Find tickets here.
Rob Thomas and Matchbox Twenty play the Mid-Florida Credit Union Amphitheatre Saturday. Tickets are here.
At The Sound, the new amphitheater in downtown Clearwater, Friday: The 2023 Sad Summer Festival, with Taking Back Sunday, The Maine, PVRIS, Mom Jeans, Stand, L.S. Dunes, Hot Mulligan and Cliffdiver. Gates open at 12:30, the show starts at 2, and tickets are available here.
A few other things
Our sole theatrical offering this weekend is the original musical OZ at freefall Theatre. After Sunday’s 3 p.m. matinee, it’s curtain down. Find tickets for tonight through Sunday here.
A Night of Classic Burlesque takes over the Palladium Side Door Friday and Saturday. Here’s our interview with the variety show’s producer Nathan Daugherty. Tickets are here.
It’s ArtWalk weekend in Gulfport (Friday) and downtown St. Pete (Saturday). Get all the details, along with news of a couple of art openings, here.
The Weekend arts forecast appears every Thursday in the Catalyst.
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