Kiss and Mötley Crüe at Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre: Review and Photos

Jamie Lees

The stage show is as big and loud and complicated as you could ever wish for, with pyrotechnics, moving pieces of stage floor, drooling/spitting blood, aerial lifts, a perch for Gene Simmons up in light rig scaffolding and a spinning platform for Paul Stanley out in the audience. (He used some sort of automated zip line to zoom there straight from the stage and it was my favorite part of the night.) Before tonight I already knew that Stanley was my favorite, but he reinforced that bias all night with his obvious love for the fans. He threw out guitar picks at every possible moment, waved at kids and made kissy faces at all of the ladies in the front rows. Dreamy.

Todd Owyoung

The songs the band played were pretty predictable, and that's just as it should be. "Detroit Rock City," "Shout It Out Loud," "War Machine," "Lick It Up" and "Rock and Roll All Nite" all got huge responses and even the new single, "Hell or Hallelujah," was well received. My favorite song of the night was "Black Diamond" (more familiar to me as "that Kiss song that the Replacements covered") because in the beginning Stanley tried to encourage the crowd to clap along, but unfortunately most of the audience suffered from the very common disease known as Caucasian Rhythm Disorder and eventually Stanley gave up the fight.

All in all it was a great first Kiss experience, but I think next time I'll go out on the lawn with the really real folks. That's where all of the fun was happening. I could see them from my seat near the front. It was a party back there. There were rivers of spilled beer and ladies on shoulders flashing their ta-tas. I gotta get in on that action.

Crüe quotes:

• "Raise your hand if you like sex!" - Vince Neil


• "I don't see your goddamn drinks! Put your drinks up!" - Tommy Lee


• "I need some fuckin' bass, Nikki!" - Tommy Lee


• "I can smell a lot of fuckin' weed out there... If you're smoking weed and covered in tattoos and you're drinking, you're at fucking Mötley Crüe tonight!" - Nikki Sixx