Gary Puckett
14 February 2004
Sunset Station, Henderson, NV
Typically, when I'm in Vegas, I'm visiting my friend Doug from college days. This weekend we watched the conclusion of the 2004 Daytona Speedweeks.
Whenever in Vegas, I try to hit at least one concert.
Gary Puckett's setlist this evening was very close to the Oldies Extravaganza show I saw in Utah a few years back. He has four songs that are in either the same or nearly the same key as each other, "Lady Willpower", "Over You", "Woman Woman", and "Young Girl". These songs are so close musically that he would have no trouble creating a medley of all four. As often is the case with aging performers, Gary sang all of these a couple semitones lower than on record.
After his decent guitar work on the Jimi Hendrix famous "Let Me Stand Next To Your Fire", Puckett again covered Stephen Stills' epic, "Love The One You're With" in Luther Vandrossian style, and added Roy Orbison's "Oh Pretty Woman".
He preceded his rendition of a track Elvis made famous on stage in the 1970s, "American Trilogy", by telling a story about meeting Elvis backstage, by being nervously overwhelmed by Elvis' compliments, and by making the mistake of introducing Elvis in the audience one evening, to a barrage of screaming women.
Most notable of this performance was his introduction of his wife, and the fact that Doug and I were the youngest people in the audience.
Gary made a very kind-hearted tribute to the military by asking all veterans in the audience to stand and accept a round of applause. Doug and I of course proudly honored the request.
[***] - Steven T.