Huey Lewis/Chicago concert review

So this past Saturday I saw the duel bill of Chicago and Huey Lewis & the News at Northerly Island on the shore of Lake Michigan in Chicago (Yeah, I know.)

In short, the concert was fantastic. Huey and the came on first and performed a nice mix of their hits and deeper cuts, starting with “Build Me Up” off Hard at Play and including both tracks from Back to the Future. Some other highlights include “(Sooner or Later) Some of My Lives Are True,” and “Doing It All For My Baby.” About half way through the show they played “It’s Alright” and half way through the song the band broke into Chicago’s “Does Anybody Really…” and trumpeter Lee Loughnane came out to do his intro. Good stuff. Then toward the end Lewis invited Bill Champlin to come out and he absolutely burnt the place down with some blues guitar and vocals. The man really in an incredible musician.

When Chicago came out they opened with the “Ballet for Buchanan” with Huey coming back out to sing “Colour My World.” Then the entire News band came back out to sing and play on “I’m A Man.” That was about the end of the crossovers and the regular band took it from there. Keith Howland sang lead on “Old Days” and the entire band was on fire. They really kicked it up a notch about 2/3 through the set on “Feeling Stronger Everyday” with some very funk-based guitar and bass work. Everything after that was just great, with the whole band seeming very loose and at the same time totally in sync.

These are my two favorite bands and to see them both on the same stage was a dream come true. Lewis came out during their set and said something along the lines of the following: “We’ve been touring with Chicago for about three weeks now and are just blown away by the passion and professionalism they have. It astounds me that so many people in America would rather watch amateurs on television sing and dance than come out and see guys like them.” That, in my opinion goes for both bands.

(by the way, this post proves I should stick to writing about movies and not music, don’t you think? Best to leave that to Mack, Clyde, J.D or Tricia. I’ve probably made at least one of those people cry.)

By Chris Thilk

Chris Thilk is a freelance writer and content strategist with over 15 years of experience in online strategy and content marketing. He lives in the Chicago suburbs.

5 comments

  1. LOL, no dude, you do what you want, man. (I’ll even overlook the punctuation and grammatical errors, but only this once!) Hey, I can only cover one post a day, which is not nearly enough to get it all in. And quite frankly, I like getting to read stuff that I didn’t personally write, so rock on!

  2. And by the way…Huey Lewis and the News and Chicago were like two of my favorite bands growing up, so big time wishin’ I was there!

  3. Sounds like the exact same concert they did here in Raleigh, NC right down to the comments about “professionalism” made by Huey Lewis! It’s always interesting to read reviews from other cities about concerts you attend in yours.

    My brief review is on my website.

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