Mellencamp in Denver 4/6/11 and general..

I saw John Mellencamp and his band at the Buell Theater in Denver on 4/6/11. I've seen him twice before, once about 10 years ago, and then again in 2008, both times at the magnificent Red Rocks. I'm not a huge fan, but I have liked his music from the beginning, and he has not stagnated, and he seems to care about his fans, so when the show was announced I grabbed some good seats.

First, the Buell Theater was a great venue. It is a modern, acoustically good theater with a capacity of 2225 normally, but it looked to me like they added a few rows in front to get an extra 100 seats or so. I'm pretty sure the show was close to sold out. Cupholders! Padded seats! Perfect sightlines! Great acoustics! Convenient parking! Pretty cool.

The film shown as a "warmup" was...a little lame. Personal opinion, YMMV. As I said,I'm not a huge, huge Mellencamp fan, but I think even a huge fan would be bored. Let's see a little documentary rather than an artfilm shot on 8mm with very little information and crappy handheld concert shots.

OK, the concert. Same setlist as the others I've seen here. I really enjoyed the first 70%, where he really emphasized his newer music and the semi-acoustic aspects. Once they came out for the obligatory full electric, "rock and roll", let's play the radio hits part, I think it fell apart a bit. I know he has to do it or risk having a bunch of angry old people yelling at him, but good God, you are in a 2300 seat acoustically fantastic theater, and when they went full electric, the mix was terrible. The bass and drums murdered the rest of the sound. Where were the sound guys? Holy crap.

Anyway, his voice was fantastic, I'm very impressed. He has a lot of little schtick moves that get old, but whatever. I like his music, and he is an entertaining guy.

And I'm sure this is generally recognized, his band rocks. He is very fortunate to be surrounded by some great players.

All in all, a nice show, he does a good job keeping everyone happy, and I personally think he has a voice that sings his words well. He is an interesting songwriter and musician, and let's face it, he's been cranking out good new music for decades, and isn't afraid of the critics or the media.

Good show, and I hope he keeps on for many more years.