Adam Ant at Mill City Nights, Minneapolis (09/01/13)

PRIMA DONNA

Opening up for Adam Ant was Prima Donna. The Los Angeles-based band was last in Minneapolis with the Dollyrots, but this time on a bigger (and nicer) stage at the Mill City Nights.



They were a little on the glam rock side, but that’s good. Their set was mostly taken from their 2012 album Bless This Mess, with the exception of “Soul Stripper” from their debut After Hours, a new song called “Like Hell”, and a cover of Leon Payne’s “Psycho”.



Full set list:
“Soul Stripper”,
“Sociopath”,
“Like Hell”,
“Bless This Mess”,
“Feral Children”,
“Psycho”,
“Maxine”, and
“I Don’t Want You To Love Me”.



As for Adam Ant, it has been many, many years since he came to Minneapolis. I want to say that the last time he was here, it was under the Adam and the Ants bill at First Avenue in 1995. So… it’s been a very long time since we saw him on the local stage, but we could speculate his return when heard about his warm up tour last year.



The thing about the new album, Adam Ant is the Blueblack Hussar in Marrying the Gunner’s Daughter, is that the album was conceived with the idea that it would lend itself to a live performance. So the band (with two drummers) had a good time playing new songs with old hits. Speaking of old classics, obviously those songs (like “Stand And Deliver”, “Desperate But Not Serious”, “Antmusic”, and “Goody Two Shoes”) had the best audience sing-along.



The first block of songs, Adam did not say much, instead songs were played back to back, sometime blending into the next song.
We didn’t get a break until Adam spoke about his girlfriend in England who left him, and it inspired him to write “Wonderful”. This followed with Adam saying how he pre-dated Fifty Shades of Grey with his “Whip In My Valise” song, as audience sang along with the chorus “who taught ya?“. I did wish he would talk more between his songs, but as you can see from the 25+ song set list, that left very little banter time if he had to keep on schedule.



Still, Adam Ant’s costume and performance is tight, as was his band. Catch him on this Adam Ant is the Blueblack Hussar in Marrying the Gunner’s Daughter U.S. tour:

09/04/13 Revolution Center – Boise, ID 09/06/13 Vogue Theatre – Vancouver, BC 09/07/13 Showbox – Seattle, WA 09/08/13 Roseland Theatre – Portland, OR 09/10/13 Grand Sierra Resort – Reno, CA

09/11/13 Ace of Spades – Sacramento, CA 09/12/13 Regency – San Francisco, CA 09/14/13 Republik – Honolulu, HI 09/17/13 Tower Theatre – Fresno, CA 09/18/13 Fremont Theater – San Luis Obispo, CA 09/20/13 Hard Rock Café – Las Vegas, NV

Trivia: The Sex Pistol’s first-ever gig was supporting Bazooka Joe (a band that was formed by Adam Ant) at St. Martins College of Art.