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| Dan |
Poison opens 20th anniversary tour in Mankato
Fans pack Civic Center; Radio DJ gets paid to attend
Amanda Dyslin
The Free Press
MANKATO —
Thousands of ’80s/’90s rock fans were yelling and applauding in anticipation of Poison’s opening number Tuesday night at the Midwest Wireless Civic Center, the band’s first gig of their 20th anniversary tour.
Barry Wortel, on the other hand, was more concerned about the Twins game.
Barry Manilow, Anne Murray — now that woulda been more like it. Wortel, KTOE Radio DJ, is an “easy listener” all the way. He doesn’t even know the names of any of Poison’s big hits, such as “Every Rose Has its Thorn.”
“Don’t tell me ... don’t tell me ... ‘Rose Like a Thorn in a Bush?’” he said.
But Wortel had no choice. He had to attend the booming, guitar-screaming, pyrotechnics-filled rock show — He got paid more than a grand to be there.
About a month ago, after country artist Martina McBride canceled her show at the Civic Center, Don Rivet said on air to Wortel during the KTOE morning show: “The next big show is Poison. I suppose you’ll be in the front row for that.”
“I said, ‘You’d have to pay me a thousand dollars to go see Poison,’” Wortel said.
A listener called in and suggested a pledge drive to get Wortel to the show, and another listener pledged the first $20. Within a week, to Wortel’s chagrin, $1,000 was raised. Before the concert Tuesday night, about $1,400 had been pledged all together, which Wortel will donate Monday to ECHO Food Shelf and The Salvation Army.
“We’ve got a lot of listeners that care about The Bear, it was nice,” Wortel said.
Or, maybe not so nice, he said, considering he didn’t want to attend.
However, in the KTOE suite during Cinderella’s set (the opening act also celebrating its 20th anniversary), Wortel wasn’t suffering too much. He was with his son and fellow DJ Red Lewis, among others, wearing a KISS T-shirt and a spiky rocker hairdo (because a couple of listeners agreed to double their pledges if he did). He also wore earplugs.
“I put these in about 30 seconds into Cinderella,” he said.
And to keep Wortel occupied well into Poison’s set (which began at about 10:15 p.m.), he had a TV to watch in the suite tuned to the Twins game. Down two to one in the bottom of the 12th inning, Jason Kubel hit a grand slam with bases loaded to win the game — surely the highlight of Wortel’s evening at the Civic Center. The only time he cheered was when the Twins scored a run, although he did clap some for the bands.
Most of the other ticket holders in the audience, however, appeared not to care much about the Twins. Not between 8 p.m. and midnight, anyway.
Despite the fact that Poison has played the Civic Center three times since 2000, the guys packed the arena just like they did the previous two times, said Eric Jones, Civic Center marketing manager. |
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| corgi37 |
Poison's 20th anniversary of what? Being shit? Dressing faggy? |
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| glencar |
Hey at least some people got meals out of this thing. Whilst I don't like Poison now, there music was popular back in the early 90's. |
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| Dan |
They are well known for selling a few thousand tickets to their core fans then giving away the rest. Saw them 2 years in a row for free. Almost like the ugly chick at closing time, alcohol did in fact make the show quite enjoyable. |
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| jb |
Like the models at the GITD concert promo? |
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| Some Guy |
back in the day we called them Posin |
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| glencar |
LOL |
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| jb |
quote:
glencar wrote:
LOL
Thanks Glencar. |
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| glencar |
You're welcome Joshy. What's for lunch? |
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