UNCASVILLE, Conn. – Prince, making a rare East Coast appearance, showed the crowd at Mohegan Sun on Saturday night why he is considered music royalty. Saturday night was the middle show of a three-night stint for the diminutive rocker from Minneapolis. Prince hasn’t played the Connecticut market in over 10 years and on Saturday night, he more than made up for his absence in this area, belting out an almost 40 song set list.
A false start with the lights going down got the crowd fired up for the show. The lights came back on to a loud chorus of boos. This only lasted a couple more minutes before the lights went down and the entire band took their place for the opening song, Act of God. This turned into a six to seven song medley, including What Have You Done For Me Lately (Janet Jackson Cover), Northside, Which Way Is Up, Dancing Machine, Partyman and Its Alright. This was high energy from the start with Prince singing and dancing around the stage while his band (actually two bands combined; The New Power Generation and 3rd Eye Girl) really got the place hopping.
Total number of musicians and dancers on stage: 20. The New Power Generation has 11 members in the horn section, three back up singers, a keyboardist, and a bass player, while 3rd Eye Girl is comprised of two female guitarists and a female drummer. As if there weren’t enough people on stage, the ensemble also included a dancer that remained on stage throughout most of the night.
Now that Prince and his band were finally warmed up, he started getting into some of his hits, Take Me With U and Raspberry Beret, then adding a Michael Jackson cover, Don’t Stop ‘Til You Get Enough, for good measure.
For the next couple of songs, it was just Prince and 3rd Eye Girl for a rocking cover of The Sweeter She Is and then Something in the Water (Does Not Compute). During Something in the Water, the backup dancer presented Prince with his guitar for the first time of the evening and he promptly showed why he is considered one of the most underrated and possibly underappreciated guitarist in today’s music scene. Prince then proceeded to rip into Let’s Go Crazy, which had the crowd roaring and dancing to the music.
The New Power Generation returned for 1999 followed by Mutiny and I Could Never Take The Place of Your Man. The set ended with a really rocking Guitar.
Prince came back for two more encores that another string of songs including, Diamonds and Pearls, Sign O’ the Times, I Would Die 4 U, Purple Rain and finally ending with Dance for Me.
Much to the dismay of the crowd and close to two and a half hours later, the house lights finally came on. With people already leaving the arena, Prince came back out with up and coming R&B singer Janelle Monae (who would open for Prince on Sunday night) to perform the Days of Wild.
I have seen a number of concerts over the past few years and many at Mohegan Sun, but I have never seen a performer keep the audience involved more than Prince did on Saturday night. He was truly electrifying and well worth the price of admission. If you haven’t seen Prince perform and you’re a live music fan, do yourself a favor and next time he is in the area, make it a point to go see him.
