Westpac Stadium, Wellington
April 18 | Reviewed by Brannavan Gnanalingam

YOU CAN SAY what you like about this concert. Rockers who are passed their used-by date living off their former glory while playing their old hits released 40 years ago. Over-priced, over-hyped and cliché-driven stadium rock played by a band who will treat this simply as another completed venue in their half-a-billion dollar world tour. Yeah, but you guys weren’t there.

The evening was started by Canadian shockers, ermm I mean rockers, Nickelback. Having already contributed part of my high ticket price to their appearance, there was no way in the world I was also going to waste my time with the bland, middle-of-the-road, unoriginal, tedious, repetitive, overly-earnest, and undeserving pile of rubbish. I suppose as a support band they’d have achieved their role by making me desperate for the main act – but that hour of their performance was better spent in a pub.

The weather was perfect and the atmosphere was stunning – the amphitheatre of the stadium worked wonderfully. What a show! It was a never-ending cavalcade of hit song after another. They played for two hours – they could easily have substituted their playlist with a two-hour B-list – all which would have been instantly recognisable to their audience. They do have 45 years of music to fall back on. So no Mother’s Little Helper, Wild Horses, Under My Thumb (well, there were no Hell's Angels there I guess) etc, but that hardly mattered.

The show kicked off with Jumpin’ Jack Flash. The sound was a bit iffy at first, but was sorted very quickly. It was so good that the early mistake in Gimme Shelter was instantly heard. The big ones were trotted out one after another – you kinda forget how huge the Rolling Stones are, and have been. Certainly their place in the music pantheon is not undeserved. Angie, Midnight Rambler, Miss You, Start Me Up, Brown Sugar, Paint it Black, Honky Tonk Women, Sympathy for the Devil, Can’t Always Get What You Want, (I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction and so on – these guys are good. So good that we can forgive most things from 1971 onwards.

But what stood out from the show was the performance. These guys haven’t lost it. You forget that they’re in the 60s as Jagger (much like Iggy Pop in his great performance at this year’s Big Day Out) contorted, danced and ran around on-stage like a rebellious teenager. Keith Richards (complete with copious cigarettes) and Ron Wood looked like excited schoolboys and Charlie Watt kept banging them out. In fact, the only give away as to their age is through some of their fans – who were often crotchety and far-cry from their previously rebellious 20-year-old selves. The moveable stage and fireworks, while great, were only sideshows to the main event. The Rolling Stones are a band that it is easy to think mattered once. They still do.