Review: Finale has two different feels

By TIMOTHY FINN
The Kansas City Star
http://www.kansascity.com/620/story/361875.html

For the last of his nine Sprint Center shows, Garth Brooks hauled in truckloads of sound and video equipment so he could share the experience with fans in movie theaters all over North America (including four in Kansas City) and in Europe.

Wednesday night’s international simulcast was beamed from an arena filled with fans who had been the first to buy tickets to the Brooks tour but the last to see him perform. For waiting the longest, he promised them something different.

They got that, though it wasn’t all good.

Instead of the usual opener, Trisha Yearwood, a film-director-type guy came on stage and tried to organize a hand-clapping routine he wanted fans to employ during Brooks’ opening song. He got a lukewarm response. He later returned and prodded fans into a big cheer for the sound truck. Likewise, they politely indulged him.

Choreography is for audiences, not mobs of fans who want to unleash their euphoria spontaneously.

Brooks and his band took the stage shortly after 8 p.m. and started this show like they had every other: with him popping out of a hole in the stage and ripping into “The Fever.” But this didn’t feel like the other shows. Instead it felt staged and restrained, as if everyone was aware of the many the cameras around them or of the new backdrop and lighting setup behind them.
For about 90 minutes, they put on a show that generated plenty of singing (especially during “Shameless,” “The River” and “Callin’ Baton Rouge”), but lacked the seismic roar of previous shows. Even Brooks’ chatter felt a little too forced and polished.

Right after “The Beaches of Cheyenne,” he paused to introduce and thank Brenda Tinnen, general manager of Sprint Center. She in turn paid thanks tothanked Brooks. Worthy gestures, but they added more manners and formality to the show.

After his usual fail-proof barrage of “Friends in Low Places,” “The Dance” and “Ain’t Goin’ Down (’Til the Sun Comes Up)” and then an emotional promise — “If you wait for me, I’ll come back” — Brooks told the fans in the arena that the feed was off, the simulcast was over, and the rest of the night was theirs alone. Instantly, his mood changed and so did theirs.

By the time he was done performing, he’d played for about two hours and 15 minutes. His second set (or extended encore) included some of the best numbers of the night: “That Summer,” “Much Too Young (To Feel This Damned Old)” and “Two Pina Coladas.” It also included a round of “Happy Birthday” for a woman from Berlin who was enjoying her present: a ticket to Garth in KC.

He ended with his solo acoustic medley: songs from James Taylor, Bob Seger and George Strait.
And he closed with “American Pie,” giving the final chorus to a crowd that was still in the mood for some communal singing, and proving, as he had all week, that if it can’t save your mortal soul, music can at least excite and comfort it.