Cheap Trick at Barrymore Theatre
While The A.V. Club has no end of nostalgia and adoration for Cheap Trick’s first few records, it only took a surprisingly short 75-minute set Monday at the Barrymore Theatre to make us slap our heads and groan, “That’s right, the ’80s did happen.” In other words, proto-cock-rock fluff like “She’s Tight” made it into the set while a few undisputed classics, like “Dream Police,” were left out. Despite these quibbles, the show was still packed with power-pop classics, budget grandiosity, and bikers in attendance to support the show's beneficiary, a cancer patient and former Cheap Trick crewman named Kirk “Wheel” Dyer. In a gracious speech before the band came on, Dyer referred to his illness as an “insidious disease that needs to get its ass kicked.”
As the house lights went down, a montage of Cheap Trick-referencing audio clips played over the house speakers, including what sounded like a foreign DJ talking over “Surrender” and various Simpsons characters name-dropping the band on the show. As the band punched through opener “Way Of The World,” “Come On Come On,” and “I Can’t Take It,” it was immediately clear that Robin Zander—who was dressed like an urban cowboy in a hat and sleeveless T-shirt—still has one of the best voices in rock ’n’ roll, and that Rick Nielsen—who was dressed like a magician at a flea market in a baseball cap and blazer—had brought a lot of fucking guitars with him. The guitarist swapped out a different axe for just about every song, including a double-neck Hamer that featured a cartoon image of Nielson giving a double thumbs-up with legs, arms, and a head sticking out of it. “I’m 60 years old and I still have no class,” Nielsen boasted while mugging with this rather creepy custom model.
Adding to the spectacle was a giant checkered light box that periodically blinded the audience during the giant pop choruses of tunes like “Tonight It’s You” and “I Want You To Want Me,” which Zander prefaced with the same declaration that he did on the live classic At Budokan: “I want you to want me!” Nielsen served up approximately 90 percent of the band’s stage banter with comments like, “We’re too dumb to quit,” “You guys have great taste,” and “we are the No. 1 band in the country for selling eight-tracks.” Nielsen also accounted for most of the band's stage presence during songs. As Bun E. Carlos labored behind the drum kit and Tom Petersson modestly hunched over his 12-string bass, Nielsen mischievously zinged guitar pick after guitar pick into the crowd, replacing them from the supply of dozens stuck to his mic stand without missing a beat, and accentuated one line of "Surrender" ("got my Kiss records out") by flinging an LP up to the Barrymore's ceiling. Toward the end of the show, Nielsen got rid of the rest of the picks by simply hurling them all off the stage like confetti, prompting crowd members to literally crawl on the floor for souvenirs. Clearly, this is a man who owns too much guitar gear.
The crowd tuned out a bit when the Rockford legends hammered out songs from their new album, The Latest, and during some of the lesser-known '80s material, but went absolutely nuts for the old stuff. As Cheap Trick closed its set proper with what could be one of the greatest rock songs of all time (“Surrender,” of course), the sound of the crowd screaming along could be heard over the band. After Dyer came back out and offered his very sincere thanks to both the crowd and the band, the foursome returned with “Gonna Raise Hell,” which featured a pummeling drum solo from Bun E. Carlos. However, it was a one-song encore. That’s all. But despite the truncated encore and short setlist, the opportunity to see the band's arena-rock antics in environs as intimate as the Barrymore—for a good cause, no less—justified the ticket price.
