Janet's Smiles

L is for Loverboy.

Loverboy was one of the bands my husband and I saw in our very first concert together, Day on the Green, in 1982!  I don’t have any pictures from that concert but I did make a page in the album using the ticket stubs and pictures of a T-shirt Bill bought me, along with a picture of the promo poster.

Well, not quite free since we took our girls with us and we went on some of the rides while we waited for the concert to start.

And there’s L – Have you ever left a show thinking that it was over and it wasn’t?  See any free concerts at the beach?

You can click over to the main A to Z Challenge page to see what other participants have come up with for this letter, and come back to see what M has for us!

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K is for Kihncert.  When Greg Kihn was working at a local radio station, he would put on a concert called Kihncert at Shoreline Amphitheater.  In 2009 the line-up was Greg Kihn Band, .38 Special, REO Speedwagon and Styx.

Greg Kihn Band

.38 Special

Greg Kihn Band was good but my favorites of the night were .38 Special and REO Speedwagon.

REO Speedwagon

REO

Styx – I love when all the confetti flies.  Glad I don’t have to clean up that mess though!

This post was originally going to just be about REO Speedwagon and their song “Keep On Loving You” because I didn’t think we had seen any “K” bands and I love that song, so I set up my whole picture presentation around REO.  I even made 6 more scrapbook layouts from another concert we had seen them at, but I wasn’t able to finish the pages and time was running out.  I decided to just post what I had so far.  When I was starting to put together the story, the first thing I typed was about “Kihncert.”  DUH!

Has that happened to you along this A to Z?  Sudden change in plans the night of the letter?  Here I thought I was so well organized.  

You can click over to the main A to Z Challenge page to see what other participants have come up with for this letter, and come back to see what L has for us!  

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J is for Journey.  I’d have to say that this is one of my top five favorite groups.  It would be number one if Steve Perry was still performing with them.  I was really hoping to see that happen when they were recently inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame but unfortunately it didn’t.  I never saw Journey when he was touring with them and I didn’t see the other Steve they had (Steve Augeri).  The first time we saw them Jeff Scott Soto was their lead singer.  He only lasted about a year and then Neal found Arnel Pineda in Manilla and he’s been singing with them since about 2007.  He is okay, but he’s no Steve Perry.

In any case, here are the layouts from the first Journey concert in 2006.  This was the one where we saw Def Leppard the first time too.  Neal Schon came out alone at first and did the Star Spangled Banner.  Blew the house down right away!

 With each pocket card I included the set list from the band.

I like making these paper bag albums and have done them for all kinds of different themes.  School days and baby’s are the most common, but they work with any occasion.  I think they make great gifts.  I have one ready for Mother’s Day in my Etsy shop. (Shameless plug of my crafting work!)

That’s our Journey with Journey.  We did see them two other times, in 2014 with Tower of Power and Steve Miller and 2016 at the big San Francisco Fest with Tower of Power, Doobie Brothers, Steve Miller and Santana.  I think my favorite show of all was the very first one!

So, have you seen Journey?  Like Arnel better than Steve Perry?

You can click over to the main A to Z Challenge page to see what other participants have come up with for this letter, and come back to see what K has for us!  

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I is for “I Am…I Said” by Neil Diamond.

Yes, up until now I have been using the name of the band to make my letter, but I haven’t seen bands with a name that starts with an “I” and so I am using my creative license to interpret the parameters of the A to Z and using the name of a song sung by Neil Diamond.  Be forewarned, this is not the only time I’m going to use a song title to meet my category, so if that bothers you, I’m sorry 🙂

Anyway, we got a chance to see Neil Diamond in 2015 and it was a great show.  We had an unusual experience at this event in that after I bought our tickets my husband hurt his back and was not going to be able to walk any distances or stand in line.  We rented a wheelchair for the evening and when we got to the venue I went and explained the situation to the helpful people at the information counter and they were able to relocate us to the handicapped section, which was on the floor toward the back.  Honestly, the seats we were given might have been better than the ones I had purchased!  It was also interesting to see what it is like to navigate as a handicapped person.  Everyone was very nice and we were taken through some parts of SAP Center we had never seen before, like service elevators under the arena.

You can click over to the main A to Z Challenge page to see what other participants have come up with for this letter, and come back to see what J has for us!

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H is for Huey Lewis and the News.

Huey Lewis is responsible for my concert addiction.  He doesn’t know that of course, but back in 2006 I won tickets to one of his concerts through a radio station.  I wrote about that last year during the A to Z – R for Radio.

It was the first concert we had been to in many years and Huey Lewis really rocked.  He was so good, even Chicago, the other group playing that night, had him come out on stage with them.  His performance with them was the best part of their show, in my opinion.  My pictures, however, are not so good.  I even printed some of them in black and white to see if that would help.

Since that concert in 2006, we’ve seen Huey Lewis at least 4 times.  All the rest have been at the Mountain Winery, where we are able to get good seats near the stage.

In 2009 we saw them and our seats were pretty close, about the 5th row back!

How about you?  Ever seen Huey Lewis?  Been to the Mountain Winery?  Go to concerts?  Share!

You can click over to the main A to Z Challenge page to see what other participants have come up with for this letter, and come back to see what I has for us!

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G is for Genesis:

Phil Collins and the boys reunited and toured in 2007, calling it the “Turn It On Again” tour.  My husband was sorry that Peter Gabriel was not going to be with them, but I didn’t have a problem with it.  (Side note:  The hubs did get to see Peter Gabriel when he toured with Sting last year, but that’s a post for a different time).

You can click over to the main A to Z Challenge page to see what other participants have come up with for this letter, and come back to see what H has for us!

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F is for Fleetwood Mac

This is another band that we have seen a few times.  The first time was way back in 2003 and I took NO pictures.  I used the cover of the new album they were promoting at the time (Say You Will) to make the page.  Christine McVie had stopped touring with them.

That’s “F” for you.  Hope you are enjoying the A to Z!

You can click over to the main A to Z Challenge page to see what other participants have come up with for this letter, and come back to see what G has for us!

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E is for Sir Elton John.  We were able to see him when he was doing the Face to Face Tour with Billy Joel.  Our original tickets were for November of 2009 but Elton John got sick and they had to cancel our part of the tour.  Fortunately they rescheduled the show so we saw them in February 2010.

This was an interesting show in which both performers were on stage to start the show, then Billy Joel left and Elton did a solo spot.  He played hit after hit, but with very little interaction with the crowd.

The big screen that they used was more like a series of lights so the pictures did not come out crisp and clear but that night it was impressive.

Without a significant break, Billy Joel then came out and did a set of his tunes.  He was more talkative and told some stories about the songs and joked about how long he’s been singing.

I wanted to add a music note to one of the pictures so I used the MISTI (Most Incredible Stamping Tool Invented) to help me get the placement right on the picture.

Finally, Elton John came back out and the two of them did the finale together.  Piano Man was a perfect choice to end the concert with.  For this layout I used the overlays again.  They come with a plain white background but I changed the paper to a blue instead.   I think the piano keys work really well.  

 Rather than just focus on the performers, I tried to get the song images, like the ballerina in “Tiny Dancer,” and the Yellow Brick Road.  Funnily, when Billy Joel sang “We Didn’t Start the Fire” and the verse came up about “England’s got a new Queen,” a picture of Elton John was flashed.  There was a really good write up about the show by Jim Harrington of the San Jose Mercury, which I printed and added to the last pages.

In 2012 I read that Billy Joel did not want to do the Face to Face tours anymore because he said it “restricted his set list.”  Sir Elton had another reason for not wanting to tour with Billy Joel, stating that he was drinking a little too much.  Last I read, though, they had “patched things up” and were friends again, although no touring together planned.

There is “E.”  Have you ever seen Sir Elton or Billy Joel?  Used a MISTI?  Love to hear comments!

You can click over to the main A to Z Challenge page to see what other participants have come up with for this letter, and come back to see what F has for us!

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D is for Def Leppard.  This is another group that we have seen several times now but I only have our first show in the concert album.  This was from August of 2006 when we saw them with Journey (they’ll make an appearance later in the alphabet).

In this concert they did not disappoint.  We’ve seen them a couple of times since then and although I have better pictures, the show itself was not as good.  They have had really poor sound systems and the bass gets so overpowering that you can’t even hear the singing.  It was so bad during the last one we went to that we ended up leaving early.  Shame because we had REALLY good seats that time!

Okay, that’s D.  So far so good.  

You can click over to the main A to Z Challenge page to see what other participants have come up with for this letter, and come back to see what E has for us!

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One of the artists that has been around awhile but whom we’d never seen was Cher.  She said she was making a final tour in 2002 and then seems to continue to tour every few years.  When I saw she was going to be at SAP Center in San Jose, I was determined to see her.  Once again, our seats were not the up close and personal that I like to get, but we were able to see her and the monitors so I managed to get some good pictures.  Cyndi Lauper was her opening act, so she gets showcased as well for the letter C.

Once again, I started with a search for papers that would complement the photos.

This paper is also from Paper Wishes and is called Mirage Double-Sided paper.  I thought the name of the paper matched as well, since Cher changed her outfit with almost every song and had a lot of circus-type stuff going on behind her during the show.

I used another template from Lea France, this time the “Say Cheese!” stencil.  In addition I used it twice, turning it sideways for one page, thereby creating a totally different look for each page.  On the first page, the one of Cyndi Lauper, I backed the pictures with a large black sheet, cut in the main shape of a camera.

On the Cher page, I left the background alone and just added some stickers.  That’s what makes these templates so useful.  You can do many different things with them.  If you look closely, you can tell that I switched paper from the picture above to the final one below.  That’s another part of the process.  Once the pictures are placed, I don’t always like my first choice of background paper.

Sometimes when I have small things that I want to attach to a page, I use this Xyron sticker maker.  It’s like magic.

Here are the finished pages.  I managed another 10 for this concert!

 It was kind of funny because Cyndi Lauper stopped one of her songs in the middle to take a camera away from somebody in the front row.  She asked him if he was video taping her and she told him to stop looking through the camera and live in the moment!  At that point I was glad I wasn’t sitting closer!

As I said, Cher changed outfits with almost every song and had a whole circus going on behind her, including acrobats flying above and sword swallowers!

She even had a trojan horse!

She did a lot of chatting with the audience too, commenting on how old she was and yet how she cold still get into her “If I Could Turn Back Time” outfit (“Take that Katy Perry!” she said).  She did look pretty darn good for 68!

She said she couldn’t do a concert without mentioning Sonny and did a virtual duet with him, showing footage of them from their early years.  It was quite touching.  For the final number she got up on this little platform that was attached to pulleys and glided her way around the arena, singing and waving to her fans.  I’m so glad we got to see her.

And there we have C for Cher (and Cyndi Lauper).  Hope you enjoyed the show 🙂  Feel free to leave me a comment.  I love them!  Also, click on one of my “follow” links so you don’t miss any of the alphabet!

You can click over to the main A to Z Challenge page to see what other participants have come up with for this letter, and come back to see what D has for us!  

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