From: Ellie

First Avenue
Nov 22, 1998
Minneapolis, MN

Hello! I have *finally* calmed down enough from my first Goo concert to actually sit down and write a review, so here it goes! I guess you could call me a new Goo Goo Dolls fan considering I hadn't noticed them until this June, but I have five of their albums and know all the songs by heart, so I kinda made up for lost time...plus I think Johnny is the hottest guy to walk the earth!

Anyway, I was so excited! I stood through Buffalo Tom completely calm- it wasn't real to me yet. I couldn't believe that the Goo Goo Dolls would actually be right in front of me, just a few feet away, within minutes. It felt like I was just kidding myself! Like,"yeah right- Johnny and Robby are going to be singing in these mics? Yeah right!" I was like, in denial! Me and my best friend were right up front in the second "row" (or whatever you want to call those supposed lines of people squished together). Between the performances when they were setting up for the Goos they'd put a giant screen down, so me and my friend were trying to look underneath and look at people's shoes and stuff, and then they put the set list down, so that was pretty cool! We tried to grab it, but they taped it down.

About 20 LONG minutes later, they pulled the screen up and they lit the candles and Dave played this eerie music on the keyboard and they started playing this music that was just heightening up to this big thing, the big thing being them walking out onto the stage- I craned my neck and looked backstage and I saw Robby and Johnny's marvelous tattooed arm, and couldn't believe they were actually right there!

When they ran out, the stage was all dark, but then they turned the lights on way bright, and there they were, playing "Dizzy"! It's funny because they always say that when you see rock stars/actors they look smaller in person- and thinner- but Johnny just seemed like a giant!!! He was right in front of me, and I've just been pretty obsessed with the guy for about 5 months now, and my knees buckled and I was afraid to look at him!!! But I got over it in about a minute, once I started singing along to "Dizzy"!

I know there's lots of Robby fans out there, so don't take this the wrong way, but I really love the Goo Goo Dolls music- you know, as a whole group, but I've always prefered Johnny's songs to Robby's- I always thought Robby was just kinda weird. I didn't see the big attraction, but after the concert, I've come to this conclusion: ROBBY ROCKS!!!!!!!!! We were so close and like, I swear to God that me and him were making total eye contact- lots of times! Because I was so close there was no mistaking that he was just looking at someone behind me or around me- he was looking at ME! He'd be playing by Johnny and he like, looked right at me so I totally GRINNED at him and then Robby grinned back at me, and then I threw my hands up in the air and started rocking out, and then Robby did about the same thing! He is such a FUN guy!!!! A ton of times that happened!

Only once I had a little thing with Johnny and that was during "Just the Way You Are". Like, no one around me knew the words and they were all just standing there and listening, but I was totally into it and SCREAMING the words, and Johnny looked out and saw me screaming the words and he smiled really wide at me and pointed at me, and gabe me the thumbs up! And Nathan kept making the funniest faces like he was making fun of how Johnny was singing or something....I don't know. Johnny squirted his water bottle on us too....which was awesome. Robby held out his bass so we could touch the end of it, which was cool. During "Lazy Eye", Johnny kept making ghost noises like,"oooooooh". During the "Name" story he said,"Can you imagine if that guy had heard 'Iris'?!" Ha ha! He was wearing, by the way, tennies, green khaki shorts, a white tank top, and a black bandana around his head- and no make-up. He tossed a couple guitar picks.

A scary thing that happened though was that my best friend passed out for about a minute- the staff guys took her off to get water and it took her 5 songs to work her way back to me! This is the songlist, in the order I am PRETTY sure it was: Dizzy, Long Way Down, slide, Lazy Eye, January Friend, Black Balloon, Bulletproof, Burnin' Up, Naked, Name, Fallin' Down, Full Forever, Broadway, Another Second Time Around, Flat Top/Sweet Home Alabama, Iris...Encore: Just the Way You Are, Hate This Place, & 2 Days in February

They're going to be here again in less than a month at this concert with a bunch of other groups and I already have my tickets! Sorry this is kinda long- but they're AWESOME! They play the best concerts ever!!!! They sound better LIVE than on their albums, which is VERY rare! If you haven't seen a Goo concert, go see one- they're totally filled with energy and excitement!!!