The cream of the crop: Rod Stewart thrills Atlantic City

How does Bruce Springsteen's song ‘Atlantic City’ put it so aptly? ‘Put your makeup on, fix your hair up pretty and meet me tonight in Atlantic City’.

There were plenty of reasons to dress up and spend an evening in Atlantic City yesterday. One of them was Sir Rod Stewart's performance at ‘Hard Rock Live at Etess Arena’ – the British singer's fifth concert on his US tour this year.

Outside, the weather was rather unpleasant in the gambling city on the east coast of the US state of New Jersey, some 200 kilometres from New York City. Inside, in the Etess Arena, located directly on the boardwalk, which was filled to capacity, around 7,000 fans eagerly awaited the performance of music superstar Rod Stewart. He took to the stage punctually at 8 p.m., waved briefly to the crowd and then opened the evening with Robert Palmer's classic ‘Addicted To Love’. It was the starting signal for another magnificent journey through music history.

As usual, the singer relied on his own hits, but also on a few cover songs, some of which only became the big hits that music fans around the world know today thanks to Stewart's interpretation.

By the time he performed the Sam Cooke cover ‘Havin' A Party’, the audience was warmed up and dancing their hearts out. Those in the arena who weren't keen on dancing tried their hand at singing along to the songs, sometimes with less than perfect results. But there was no shortage of fun on and off stage at any point during the evening. This was also due to the fact that Sir Rod was always in the mood for a little banter, winking at the front row here or high-fiving a few audience members there. And the 81-year-old not only had rock hits like ‘Young Turks’ and ‘Hot Legs’ in his repertoire, but also sentimental songs like ‘You're In My Heart,’ ‘The Killing Of Georgie’ and ‘Have I Told You Lately.’

The audience proved to be particularly familiar with the lyrics, which clearly delighted the star on stage.

Compared to Thursday's show in St. Augustine, ‘Tonight's The Night’ returned to the set list, while ‘The First Cut Is The Deepest’ slipped to the end of the evening and became the last big highlight of the show, with oversized balloons raining down from the ceiling.

When Stewart and his once again magnificent musicians (needless to say, word should have gotten around by now) left the stage with a final wave to the audience, two hours had passed far too quickly for many visitors.

‘Rod is simply a legend,’ said fan Jason. And Maria, who had a seat right at the front of the stage, hastened to add: ‘He was incredible, what a great concert tonight.’ Judy agreed: ‘It was fantastic, Jersey loves you, Rod.’

And Ted wished Rod would spend a little more time in town. "He could have visited our model railway club here.

That would have been great, but okay, the concert was still top notch."

Set list:

• Addicted To Love
• You Wear It Well
• Having A Party
• Have You Ever Seen The Rain
• Ooh La La
• Hot Legs
• Tonight's The Night
• You're In My Heart
• Forever Young
• Maggie May
• I'd Rather Go Blind
• Young Turks
• Downtown Train
• Lady Marmalade (band only)
• The Killing Of Georgie
• People Get Ready
• Have I Told You Lately
• Proud Mary (band only)
• It Takes Two
• Some Guys Have All The Luck
• Da Ya Think I'm Sexy
• Love Train
• The First Cut Is The Deepest