Heart in Halifax

Really good concert tonight at the Metro Centre. Ann Wilson showed she still had her voice, albeit a few tones lower than 30+ years ago. She still belted out the memorable parts to Heart's classics and Nancy still rocked her guitar, mandolin, autoclave, and vocals.

Tonight's setlist (from memory and help from a setlist last summer in Nashville. There were a couple changes for Halifax, but this is basically the show):

1. Cook With Fire - off their latest album and my favourite of the 4 new songs they played. Good beat and rhythm, strong opener.
2. Heartless - classic, really fun to play on the drums.
3. What About Love - 80's fan favourite.
4. Straight On - another good song with a solid guitar hook.
5. Dog & Butterfly - slowed it down a little for this title track from the 70's.
6. Desire Walks On - title track of one of their albums that Ann admitted was not a commercial success. The chorus was very heavy and seemed like there was too much going on, especially for a Heart song where Ann and Wilson's talents should be at the forefront.
7. Hey You - new song. Ann played the autoclave. It was OK but the "na na na na" chorus seemed like they tried to write an intentional sing-along song.
8. Even It Up (with Rolling Stones Gimme Shelter intro/bridge) - great song and a clever mash-up with one of my favourite Stones songs.
9. Red Velvet Car - title track from the new album. It was just OK to me.
10. Alone - great torch song from 1987. Remember 1987? :-)
11. WTF - new song, heavy sound, second favourite of mine of the new songs they played.
12. Magic Man - great 70's song, the keyboard player did an especially good job with the sound at the end.
13. Crazy On You - one of my favourites to play on Guitar Hero.
14. Barracuda - my favourite Heart song. Here is video (sorry, only 3 minutes, to the end of the guitar solo, ran out of memory!):



First Encore
15. What Is and Should Never Be - Led Zeppelin cover that they nailed, especially Ann's vocals.
16. Love Reign On Me - The Who cover was well done, but would not have been my choice as a show closer.

Second Encore
17. Dreamboat Annie - for us Canucks since this album was first released in Canada. Nice tip of the hat to their band's Canadian roots to finish the show with this one.