By Jeremy Borash
On a cold March evening, John Mellencamp played the Target Center on his “Whenever We Wanted Tour.” Not like you are interested, but I went down to the Target Center with absolutely no tickets. We arrived and asked the box office what kind of seats they could give us. It turned out that the minute we asked for the tickets, the will call seats that were not picked up were just put on sale. We ended up with seats right on the side of the stage on the lower level. People had to camp out to get those kind of seats… so we were happy.
The stage was red with light decorations hanging throughout the entire building, but it still gave a relatively plain feeling. I believe that was his intention. His stage backdrop consisted of three Mellencamp paintings with classical music in the background. Mellencamp’s opening act was a juggler. Although he hadn’t even taken the stage, he had already put on an interesting show and set a mood.
Mellencamp opened the show in darkness and an ear blasting rap-like drumbeat which evolved into “Love and Happiness.” Mellencamp then followed with “Paper in Fire,” “Jack and Diane,” and an interesting acoustical version of “Again Tonight.” The only low part of the show was when he got political and asked why it was so hard to vote in America, then stated that people should be able to vote over the phone. It just didn’t fit in with the show very well.
He continued with his well known songs. He had no special explosion or light effects, his music was sufficient entertainment to keep the 17,000 fans happy. His final song, “Cherry Bomb,” was done with all of the house lights on and ended one of the most enjoyable concerts I have ever attended.