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Admin~

Re-posted here by popular demand! Have at it rock and rollers!

Here is the N & O's story from today's paper:

Cary show more 'guess who?' than The Who

By David Menconi, Staff Writer Comment on this story <#MI_Comments_Link>
Five days after the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame concert in Cary, it's still either a question or an answer: Who was backstage as the unannounced big-name "special guest" Saturday night?

Whoever it was never appeared onstage. Jack Bruce's set ended about 11:45 p.m. Saturday, well past the 11 p.m. curfew at Cary's city-owned Koka Booth Amphitheatre. But the scheduled closing "tribute to The Who" didn't happen.

When asked, concert chairman Rick French declined to identify the mystery guest.

"Who was or was not there is a moot point," French said. "What we had planned is no longer relevant. People can speculate all they want, and it doesn't matter."

Before the show, rumors were flying around that the closing guest would be Pete Townshend, guitarist for The Who. Lending credence to the rumors, the two-day festival was a benefit for the John Entwistle Foundation. Named for the late Who bassist, the foundation provides music education for needy children.

Townshend would have upped the concert's celebrity quotient considerably. Cary resident French, a trustee of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, announced the show in April with a Web site likening it to Woodstock, Monterey and Isle of Wight -- historic and legendary rock festivals all.

"This will be one of the bigger music events in the country without a doubt," French told the Cary News.

Instead of big names, however, the lineup largely consisted of lesser-known acts, including former members of Styx, Deep Purple and Grand Funk.

In the wake of the show, some posts appeared on the rockhallbenefit.com <http://rockhallbenefit.com> forum complaining about the show being cut short. Saying the forum had been hacked, French shut it down Monday.

In the forum's absence, a couple of online groups started up, launch.groups.yahoo.com/group/RockHOFCary <http://launch.groups.yahoo.com/group/RockHOFCary> and caryrhofshowlives.forumotion.net <http://caryrhofshowlives.forumotion.net>.

Two of the hot topics this week have been whose fault it was that the show was cut short, with various posters blaming the venue, the town of Cary and the promoter; and whether Townshend was actually in Cary. One poster even claimed to have seen Townshend get out of a limousine at the venue.

But it does not appear that Townshend was in Cary last weekend, or even the Western hemisphere. Contacted by e-mail, Townshend's personal assistant Nicola Joss responded: "Pete was enjoying a quiet family weekend here in Richmond [England]. There was never any question of Pete appearing anywhere."

Lyman Collins, cultural arts manager for the town of Cary, said there was no sign of Townshend at Booth Amphitheatre on Saturday night.

"I never saw Pete Townshend there, and I was backstage the entire time," Collins said. "No staff member saw him or interacted with him."

*'Rumor has it ...'*

As Saturday's show wore on, there were conversations between Collins, French and Booth general manager Becky Schmidt about allowing the show to go past curfew -- which it did, with the approval of Cary mayor Harold Weinbrecht.

Schmidt says that French himself implied that Townshend was going to play.

"It was mentioned that he may or not be at the venue, and he may or may not perform," Schmidt said. "Rick phrased it, 'Rumor has it that he may or may not be here.' I consulted with my production staff, but we could not confirm that he was there."

French denied Schmidt's version of the conversation.

"I didn't say, 'Rumor has it,'" French said. "That's not exactly what I said. But it was a private conversation about where we were at the time."

As to where the Townshend rumors came from, French said he was not the source.

"We put it on sale and announced the lineup," French said. "Whatever people believed or imagined about who the guests might be, that didn't come from me. It was a fabulous show, people got their money's worth. We hope to do it again somewhere next year. Maybe Cary, or Raleigh, or some other part of the country."

david.menconi@newsobserver.com <mailto:david.menconi@newsobserver.com> or blogs.newsobserver.com/beat <http://blogs.newsobserver.com/beat> or (919) 829-4759

The link for this story:

http://www.newsobserver.com/105/story/1231328.html

I think the thing that gets me about all of this is the complete whitewash that is happening now (the mayor's blog says only 3 of Jack Bruce's songs were cancelled - almost none of the articles mention that there were any problems at all).

So far, Jennifer Robinson (councilwoman) is the only one who has apologized and admitted that things could have been better. And she wasn't responsible for the original mess, just a small part of how it was cleaned up (or not).

As I said before (the other board came down), whether or not Pete was behind door #2, the concert did not end as planned. The promised artists all had their sets cut dramatically. Regardless of who (no pun intended) was supposed to be on stage to finish the concert with a Who tribute, we were always promised a tribute to the Who/John Entwistle as the end of the festivities.

So, there is a serious problem with this attitude of "It was a great show - you saw who we promised" with absolutely no acknowledgement that as Jen said "Mistakes were made - we're sorry - we'll do better next time - thank you for your support"

Instead we are made out to be ungrateful for what we did receive. I will say again, what we did receive was AWESOME. There was an extraordinary amount of musical talent on that stage and I for one will always remember this concert very fondly.

That does not mean that we can't be disappointed that the ending DID NOT HAPPEN THE WAY THE ORGANIZERS INTENDED. If they would just acknowledge that instead of blaming the fans for being ungrateful and pretending it never happened, it would have been much more productive.

I agree with the above statements. I would like to also add that I'm a huge fan of the Who's music and I bought my tickets originally because of the promised "Tribute to the Who." Regardless of who the promised "special guests" turned out to be, I was very excited to see "Jack Bruce sit in on bass" during the promised Who tribute.

The Who were the first band that I ever saw live in concert. They have a very special place in my heart. I also agree that I didn't want to complain too much about the ending because I didn't want to add any tarnish to John's memory. But I also agree that if things beyond Rick's power happened. That if he really tried his best. Then we should have at least received a sincere apology. That would have made me feel better. The above quotes do not make me feel better. They make me rather angry. I still feel extremely ripped off. Yes, you can see in the highlights thread that I enjoyed most of what I saw. But I was robbed of the part that I bought the tickets to see.

P.S. There's no way that anyone will ever convince me that the horrid, absolutely horrid rendition of "My Generation" at the end counts as a tribute.

Could this have been one of the posts that led to some confusion or possibly "deflation" at the end of the show? Hmmmm. I wonder?



At the point in time this post appeared on the original forum, I think Dennis DeYoung had not yet been rolled out. (Note the time stamp on the image)

Jack Bruce turned out to be the "very special guest" mentioned in the post.

While there were other walk-on appearances anticipated (and implied for months by Rick French in multiple posts), not one materialized. That, I think, is the promise that dissapointed most. The abrupt ending also denied the crowd the finale, which as Rick's post stated would have most, if not all headliners on stage together.

For me, that was like playing pinball and getting within a few points of the record high score, only to have ball five come out of the chute and head straight down the middle to the ball return gate!

Tip:
If you have difficulty reading the small type in the image, hold down your "ctrl" button while scrolling your mouse wheel forward. That will enlarge the image.

I think a little empathy goes a long way. I was, and remained SOOOOOO positve during the original forum, that at times , I felt that my remarks became obnoxious to some!
Be that as it may- instead of taking the side of the FANS- (who are who made this a great concert), some chose to belittle the fact that without us, there would have been no show at all. It was great, but if there were a few things that were a muss, don't blame us for our constructive critsism. Maybe a simple " thanks for all of your support" would be grealty appreciated. There are folks that drove hours to see the show. And yes, it was good..........

Ya know woody, I think the ones who really ought to be upset are the stage crew. I remember they were given all sorts of accolades throughout the show for the outstanding job they were doing, only to get dissed in the end by remarks about the long set changes. I bet they are a little peaved, ya think?

Admin~

Yes- I do agree with that in part- but I'm thinking --they were just being paid to do a job- the best that they could. And they did.
I'm sure worse things have happenend at a concert! However, the fans/consumers were there for another reason. It's just good business to put the customer first- I do not mean to sound ungreatful at all, but does'nt it make sense?

Moved to the appropriate thread for BrewIT:

BrewIT




Joined : 25 Sep 2008
Posts : 1
Location : Hillsborough

Subject: A Couple of things Thu 25 Sep 2008 - 16:11

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The Sound Levels
Just curious - Am I the only one who noticed what a poor job was done on Saturday setting up the sound for each act? OMG this was supposed to be a Professionally done concert comparable to some of the best show in history!! What a load of crap. Hey I did enjoy the music and was happy to see what I came to see! But when the first number by Jefferson Starship was so out of wack I thought someone on stage might have noticed and done some adjusting for the second number. You could barely her the lead vocalist Kathy? And the others were way too loud. I'm just your average concert going listener and I noticed like crazy! Rick you ought to be slapped for this oversight in my opinion. Things did work out over the course of the evening but the sound needs to be right from the getgo for the pros!

Those Lights!
Those annoying white lights - you know the 2 banks of 8 each - Aircraft Landing lights - that someone thinks is a good idea to blind everyone with!. Well I think they suc!. What a buzz kill to be occassionally be attacked by those lights over the course of the concert. This wasn't exactly a crowd of teenagers who I can imagine might be thrilled by the glaring lights of stardom. If you need to shine lights on the crowd do it with the stadium lights form above...

The Marketing Scam
I did enjoy myself - I really did! But I still feel that Rick did such a terrific marketing job on late night radio and so seriously over-hyped this concert that he pulled off the greatest marketing scam of late. (Except what out Federal Reserve and Treasury are about to pull off of course!)
I fell for it though!! In afterthought there were a couple of red flags that should have signaled a hoax of sorts in the making. For Instance the comparison to Woodstock and Monterey when the conceert was scheduled for Koka Booth where all concerts end at 11:00pm. Hardly enough time for a good dose of mushrooms (kidding!)
I was going to the concert anyway since I'd never seen Dave Mason live and I've been a fan since the Alone Together album came out. His performance was supurb! My daughter who was hearing him for the first time was equally impressed. A future Traffic fan maybe..

Summary to Rick - I will have a very hard time believing anything Rick might try to sell in the future. Too bad for the R&RHOF since there name is all over this one. Sure I got my fifty bucks worth but I assure you you would rather have the full backing of a happy audience when you try to sell the next one. I bet you lost half the crowd anyway

Rock on Friends!
B