Styx, Foreigner & Joh Waite / June 28, 2024 / Honda Center, Anaheim, Ca.

 Review and Photos by Chris Loomis

https://styxworld.com/

Foreigner | The Official Website (foreigneronline.com)

http://www.johnwaiteworldwide.com/

Foreigner and Styx . . . combined that is 100 years of rock n roll, tons of multi-platinum albums and dozens of hits . . . these two rock radio giants have teamed up for the last time for The Renegades & Juke Box Hero Tour 2024 with very special guest John Waite. These three acts dominated radio and MTV in the 70’s and 80’s and to no surprise they played a SOLD-OUT show at Honda Center to 15,000 fans in Anaheim, CA on Friday night June 28

At 7:00pm John Waite hit the stage as the fans were slowly filling the arena and opened the show with “Midnight Rendezvous” from The Babys 1980 album Union Jacks. Waite remains an absolute showman – he looked great, sounded great and took the crowd on a nostalgic ride through hits by The Babys, Bad English and solo material. The highlights were of course “Missing You”, “When I See You Smile” and “Every Time I Think of You” as well as the guitar mastery of Brent Woods who previously played with Sebastian Bach and is currently the guitarist for Chevy Metal. The set ended with a killer cover of Led Zeppelin’s “Whole Lotta Love” . . . John Waite was the PERFECT opening act for this tour and delivered an ideal 40 minutes of music. 

Tommy Shaw, James “J.Y.” Young, Lawrence Gowen, Terry Gowen, Todd Sucherman, Will Evankovich and Chuck Panozzo hit the stage with larger-than-life smiles and took Anaheim on a magical musical journey over the next 80 minutes. The night began with “The Grand Illusion” and then into the mega-hit “Too Much Time on My Hands”. At this point not a single person was seated. The Honda Center was ready to rock.

Shaw addressed the crowd, Gowan introduced the band, original bass player Chuck Panozzo made an appearance and played on a few songs. Styx has the rockers, the mid-tempo classics and the slower ballads–something for everyone and everyone has a memory tied to hearing these songs on the radio in the 70’s and 80’s. The band remains extremely dynamic onstage–Gowan is spinning and climbing all over his keyboards and Shaw is all over the stage playing different guitars for each song . . . the band just delivers an in-your-face rock n roll show and does so better than ever in 2024.

The highlight of the night without a doubt was the encore which consisted of the amazing “Mr. Roboto”–YES, the band started playing this song live again a few years ago and the fans LOVE, and I mean LOVE it!! Then Mr. Panozzo made another appearance for the last song of the set "Renegade”– the perfect way to end their time on stage . . . Shaw still sounds amazing and Gowen’s voice is beyond mesmerizing. Styx ROCKED SoCal once again.

 In late 2022 Foreigner announced the start of their “Farewell” tour, and they apparently are not done saying goodbye . . . the band responsible for so many top 10 hits electrified the stage at Honda Center with an 85-minute banger of a show with no signs of slowing down. Opening the show with a 1-2-3 explosion of hits –“Double Vision”, “Head Games” and “Cold as Ice” before slowing it down with “Waiting for a Girl Like You”, vocalist Kelly Hansen and team seem a far cry away from needing to “hang it up” and call it a day. Guitarists Bruce Watson and Luis Maldonado nail the riffs and the solos while bassist Jeff Pilson and drummer Chris Frazier hold down the rhythm with Michael Bluestein on keyboards stitches it all together. The band is an energetic force onstage delivering a well-orchestrated performance.

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copyrighted Photos BY CHRIS LOOMIS