Here's a review I just found, pretty decent:
http://www.theoaklandpress.com/stories/112806/loc_2006112807.shtmlWeb Exclusive
Guns N' Roses, Tenacious D Rock The Motor City
Web-posted Nov 28, 2006
By GARY GRAFF
Of the Oakland Press
Forget the BCS standings. On Saturday night, the Detroit metro area hosted a battle for the title of Most Awesome Rock 'n' Roll Band on the Planet.
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Duking it out in separate corners were Guns N' Roses, which really did set? rock's standard for awesomeness in the late '80s and rocked the Palace of Auburn Hills with a very late but fierce display of muscular hard rock, and Tenacious D, the comic metal duo of actors Jack Black and Kyle Gass who had a devilishly good time?convincing the crowd at?Detroit's Masonic Temple Theatre that it was "the greatest band of all time."
Like many college football polls, no clear-cut winner could be determined, but both shows had abundant merits tempered by a few shortcomings.
No discussion of a Guns N' Roses concert can be had without mention of the time issue, of course. The group, whose sole remaining founding member is frontman W. Axl Rose, hit the Palace stage just after 11:30 p.m. Saturday - more than 70 minutes after former Skid Row singer Sebastian Bach finished his opening set and late enough for one to see Tenacious D and still make it out to the Palace in time for GNR's start. But it also gave the already fired-up but sparse-looking crowd of just over 7,500 time to get a bit drunker and rowdier and start a few more fights during the wait.
Rose made light his reputation during the two-hour and 15-minute showing, explaining that "for me, this is morning. Consider me your Captain Kangaroo. I'm just here having a good morning workout time with my friends in Michigan." Maybe so, but it was late-night for the crowd, and who, after all, does Rose's self-involved temperament really serve? Certainly not any underage fans who may have had to leave due to curfew restrictions - especially if they drove to the Palace. Certainly not any of the fans who had to endure the lengthy wait.
And certainly not the band or the show itself. Saturday's crowd was a shadow of the size of audience GNR used to command, a function of the band's diminished footprint since its last set of fresh material was released in 1993. And you can bet some of the reluctance to turn out for the show was a function of the near-certainty that Rose and company would be late - assuming they played at all (and last-minute cancellations have been known to happen) or didn't bugger out early, as Rose did during GNR's 2002 visit to the Palace.
As it was, GNR gave the faithful the works this year - and as potent a rock show as any band turns out these days. It was heavy on favorites - "Welcome to the Jungle," "It's So Easy," "Mr. Brownstone," "Sweet Child O' Mine," "Patience," "Nightrain," the epic "November Rain," "Paradise City" and covers of Paul McCartney & Wings' "Live and Let Die" and Bob Dylan's "Knockin' on Heaven's Door." GNR also offered a generous helping from the long-awaited and still-unreleased "Chinese Democracy" album, including the biting title track, the industrial-flavored "Better," the melodic epic "The Blues," the charged "I.R.S." and the moody "Madagascar."
Changing tops a half-dozen times, Rose looked leaner and even more animated than when GNR was last here, and his trademark wail as in good form. The band, particularly longtime keyboardist Dizzy Reed and more recent guitarists Robin Finck and Richard Fortus, proved able replacements for the original GNR cast, although the solo spots that padded the show - a gratuitous hard rock indulgence in the best of circumstances - seemed particularly superfluous given the late hour, and significant clumps of fans trooped out as the show went on so that maybe half were around as the confetti swirled overhead as the band played "Paradise City" when most bars were making last call.
And that late start is for who's benefit again?
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I cut the review of Tenacious D.
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