Heart plays Vegas iHeart Festival
On September 20th 2019 Heart played at the iHeart festival in Las Vegas.
It’ll be broadcasted on The CW Network on October 2nd and 3rd at 8 p.m. ET/PT.
Love Alive’s 1st leg finale
Fearing this Heart tour might be their last*, I caved in and flew across the Atlantic to experience a couple of shows. I’m so happy I did. Once the tour started a saw a lot of fans complain about the setlist, the bandmembers, Ann’s voice and the lack of sisterly love on stage. So I went to the show in Concord (California) with rather low expectations. I saw Heart perform one of their best shows in a long long time however! 12.000 people there had a great time. Seeing Heart play the much smaller Pearl venue in Vegas was a treat and see them finishing this leg at a thundering Hollywood Bowl is something I’ll never forget.
Setlist
Yes, as we’ve all grown accustomed to, the setlist is heavy on the 70s and light on the 80s and after. But a longtime fan would kill to hear Rockin’ Heaven Down, Love Alive, Little Queen and Mistral Wind live in one show. I haven’t seen a better setlist for decades. I do hope Ann doesn’t open their second leg shows announcing a trip through the decades while playing nothing from the 90’s and after. That may have been true earlier in the tour, but all that stuff got replaced.
Band
The bandmembers on this tour are basically the ones Ann recruited for her solo adventures. Throw in two stellar guitarists Nancy and Ryan Waters and you’ve got yourself a true wall of sound. I would have preferred to see more familiar faces on that stage like Ben and Dan, but I soon noticed that my attention was drawn to the sisters full time. As long as it sounds good, the majority of the audience probably doesn’t really care who plays the keys or the drums. And it did sound really good.
Ann
Okay, let’s be fair. Ann is 69 and does not hit those high notes with ease or sometimes not at all. Anyone surprised? Anyone wants their money back? Hell no. I was very impressed with her voice and her emotional delivery (like on What About Love and Alone). At the Hollywood Bowl show she had a bit more trouble as it was a show in a long exhausting line of shows. By the way: Nancy sang some great leads and together the sisters sound as good as always (for instance on The Boxer).
Sisterly love
This topic has been so divisive these last years and even during this reunion tour. I agree with what many fans have been saying. Ann and Nancy interact a lot less than previously in their joint career. But it is really not as bad as you’d think. And does it really matter? Not to me. And if it does matter to you so much, then you gotta ask yourself why it is so important to you. They have their little moments and I even got to witness a good old hug. Seeing them together on stage as Heart gave me chills and it made me realize that their split up had affected me much more than I admitted.
There is so much video on Youtube and Facebook out there, so I’ll just post a couple. I have three live video’s on Facebook:
Live from Concord: These Dreams
Live from Vegas: Little Queen
Live from Hollywood: Stairway To Heaven
Cal Vid posted the entire Hollywood Bowl Show here and for the encore here.
Check out Heart on the second leg of the Love Alive Tour.
*This tour has not been billed as the last Heart tour. I have no information about a new tour either.
Love Alive setlist and vids
Four shows into the tour it is a good moment to show some highlights.
A typical setlist features these 16 songs: Rockin’ Heaven Down | Magic Man | Love Alive | Your Move (Yes cover) | I Heard It Through the Grapevine
(Marvin Gaye cover) / Straight On | The Boxer (Simon & Garfunkel cover) | Comfortably Numb (Pink Floyd cover) |Back to Avalon | These Dreams | Dog & Butterfly | What About Love | Mistral Wind | Crazy on You | Encore: The Battle of Evermore (Led Zeppelin cover) | Barracuda | Alone
On opening night Ann’s solo composition “Anguish” was played as well, fans say.
Social Media is flooded with video from the shows, but here are a few extra interesting ones:
Update July 24th 2019: The band has been trying to find a setlist that suits them best. A couple of songs have been replaced on the 16 song setlist. Comfortably Numb, Battle of Evermore and Back To Avalon have been removed (but might come back!). New songs are: Stairway to Heaven, Even it Up and Bebe le Strange. These last two make 1980 Bebe le Strange the most played album on this tour: a rocking album! (thank you Kerri!)
Update July 28th 2019: “Million Miles” popped up at several recent shows but has now been replaced by “Little Queen” it seems. Also some shows have a 15 song setlist.
LOVE ALIVE TOUR STARTS
After rehearsals in Nashville and St. Louis MO, the long awaited return of Heart happens tonight at the Hollywood Casino Amphitheatre in St. Louis MO.
On social media many video’s have been posted building up to this evening. Some say these videos say something about the setlist. WildChild has collected a list that has Mistral Wind, Back To Avalon and Rocking Heaven Down on it next to the usual big hits. According to heart.com Ann plans to do more than play Heart hits: “We want to go through the best of all of Heart’s catalog. Not just the hits. I mean I’d be lying if I told you we weren’t gonna do something like ‘Barracuda,’ you know. But we are gonna not only do Heart songs from different eras, my dream is to have a short little part of the set that has Nancy’s stuff from [her solo band] Roadcase Royale, and a short part that’s from [my last solo album] Immortal for me, and then the rest is Heart.” Though a setlist often changes between the first date and the rest of the tour, we’ll know very soon what the band has come with.
Heartlinker.nl will be attending a couple of West Coast shows. The wait will be difficult.
MORE TOURDATES!
Sep 26, 2019 NORTHWELL HEALTH AT JONES BEACH THEATRE WANTAGH, NY
Sep 27, 2019 PRUDENTIAL CENTER NEWARK, NJ
Sep 28, 2019 HUNTINGTON CENTER TOLEDO, OH
Oct 1, 2019 VERIZON ARENA LITTLE ROCK, AR
Oct 2, 2019 BOK CENTER TULSA, OK
Oct 4, 2019 FEDEX FORUM MEMPHIS, TN
Oct 5, 2019 CAJUNDOME LAFAYETTE, LA
Oct 7, 2019 WELLS FARGO ARENA DES MOINES, IA
Oct 8, 2019 STARLIGHT THEATRE KANSAS CITY, MO
Oct 12, 2019 FISERV FORUM MILWAUKEE, WI
Oct 13, 2019 XCEL ENERGY CENTER ST. PAUL, MN
What are the sisters up to?
While Ann & Nancy are preparing for their huge Summertour as Heart, the ladies have been throwing all kinds of stuff our way. Ann has continued her videoseries about “Da Shoe” and “Ruby Tales”, mixed with her views on life. In the “Da Shoe” (now up to 12 episodes) a sneakerboot can be seen going around her house. You even get to see her huge Heart collection. “Ruby Tales” is a beautiful classic car that Ann and her husband have purchased. Nancy has put her house up for sale (according to LA Times and UCR) and will be performing on May 15th at “Acoustic for a Cure”. Heart has put up vids about the upcoming tour: Ann talks about playing “Sand” and Nancy is pondering “Nada One” (YES PLEASE!). Nancy made an appearance in NYC recently and looks ready to shine.
Also, Heartmongers can enjoy the upcoming Musical version of Almost Famous.
