In The Year 2000

After Ali Wong's hilarious stand-up, I headed to the Opera House to see Dwayne Gretzky, the cover band supergroup. Tonight was their first show at this baroque venue. Usually they play their themed shows at the larger Phoenix Concert Theatre. I wonder if it was a scheduling issue or they felt that a 2000s theme show would draw a smaller crowd than their usual target demographics. Well, it was still a packed and sold-out crowd, though they did skew quite younger, a blunt reminder of your own decrepitude.

Like all their shows, it was high-energy because everybody knew all the words. Tonight, it was Cake (Short Skirt/Long Jacket), Avril Lavigne (Complicated), Kelly Clarkson (Since U Been Gone), The Killers (Mr. Brightside) and many other luminaries from the aughts. It did seem to go against their dad rock image of Springsteen and Bowie, until you realized these tune are on average 15 years old. So even these songs qualify for that moniker, at least if your memories of them aren't associated with drunken high-school or college revels.