The kickoff to Foo Fighters’ US summer stadium tour at Citi Field in Queens, New York, didn’t go as planned on Wednesday (July 17th) when a round of thunderstorms cut short the band’s set after an hour and 20 minutes. Thankfully, fans who attended the second show at Citi Field on Friday (July 19th) were treated to the whole Grohl show.
In fact, Friday’s weather was damn near perfect, with lower humidity making for a comfortable evening. The sun was still out in full force when Australian pub-punkers Amyl and the Sniffers took the stage at 5:30 p.m. While the stadium was still mostly empty at the time, it didn’t stop singer Amy Taylor and company from delivering a high energy half-hour set, including our recent Heavy Song of the Week, “U Should Not Be Doing That.”
At 6:30, it was time for Swedish punkers The Hives to take the stage, and they captured the stadium crowd’s attention from the get-go. Singer Howlin’ Pelle Almqvist could teach a master class in fronting a band, combining humor and bravado into a highly entertaining character who looks like the love child of The New York Dolls’ David Johannsen (or Buster Poindexter, to some) and The Rolling Stones’ Mick Jagger.
Almqvist’s tongue-in-cheek cockiness and audience interaction was only matched by the infectiousness of The Hives’ songs, including the Stooges-eque “Good Samaritan,” their breakout US hit “Hate to Say I Told You So,” and the set-closing anthem “Tick Tick Boom.”
The Hives certainly warmed up the crowd for Foo Fighters, who walked out onstage at 8 p.m. and promptly ripped into “All My Life” with the fury of a young band trying to win over a crowd at a small club. Only in this case, it was a sold-out stadium of roughly 40,000 people.
Dave Grohl made immediate reference to the previous show, letting the “Night 2” fans know he was watching the weather report all day, and that they were likely in for the full three-hour experience this time around. The band followed “All My Life” with “No Son of Mine” (featuring a bit of Black Sabbath’s “Paranoid”), “Rescued,” “The Pretender,” and “Walk,” offering a lively beginning to what would be a marathon set.