REO Speedwagon Still Rolling

It was a hot, summer night on Sunday, July 15 at The Fraze Pavillion in Kettering, Ohio. Summertime is the perfect time for concerts, especially outdoor venues, and no better place than The Fraze Pavillion, which offered friendly staff, great seating, and wonderful acoustics. The Fraze had a wonderful show planned with Midwest rockers, REO Speedwagon, coming to the stage. REO Speedwagon was even playing for a good cause, to raise money for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation. Hard rockers, but with big hearts it looks like.

The evening kicked off with local personalities from the Dayton area participating in the 10^th Annual Celebrity Karaoke contest. This was very entertaining and a lot of the contestants actually had really good voices, which was nice to hear. The singers sang their hearts out on stage to the onlookers, but only one winner would stand alone in the end. Prizes were offered to contestants and it was an all around fun event for the people involved and for the people watching.

The next thing I saw with my own two eyes was very surprising, Kevin Cronin, lead singer of REO Speedwagon, coming out to the stage in t-shirt and beach-like shorts. But, he wasn't ready to play yet, he was ready to gain more money for the cause of Cystic Fibrosis. He and other band-mates auctioned off signed instruments including autographed drum sticks and drum head, guitars, and even the shirt right off Kevin's back! No kidding, Kevin was even willing to auction off his own shirt in which he would autograph it, "puke on it if I had to," he jokingly said and all the sweat included. He wound up taking the highest bidder and a woman got to come to the stage to accept the shirt off Kevin's back, signed by him, and got to shake his hand. I thought that was really cool on Kevin's part and shows what kind of character he has as a not just a dedicated rock star, but as a dedicated human being. He and the rest of his band-mates really cared for the people and the cause that day in Ohio and it definitely showed to the many fans in attendance.

Now, as for REO Speedwagon, they were hittin the road to promote their new album, Find Your Own Way Home. This was REO's first studio album in over a decade, so very exciting stuff for the group as a whole and for the fans. I, myself, have always enjoyed REO Speedwagon's music, growing up with those familiar sounds of "Take It On The Run" and "Can't Fight This Feeling" just to name a few. REO Speedwagon dates back to the 70s and over the span of their career have achieved 13 Top 40 singles, produced 17 albums, and have sold more than 40 million albums to date. Not bad for these Midwest rockers from Illinois, to say the least.

The new album, Find Your Own Way Home, is already proven to be a hit in my book with not one bad song on the album, in my opinion. Actually, Kevin and I talked about the process of making an album during a phone interview and how disappointed I was about how artists these days just can't make a "Dark Side of the Moon" or an "Abbey Road". The quality of producing a whole album has definitely gone down, in my eyes, and Kevin agreed but was very sorry to hear that at the same time. He wanted to somehow rekindle my faith on the whole concept of making a good album, from beginning to end by offering me to listen to the new REO Speedwagon album. I took a listen not long after that and I have to say, it was music to my ears because I was listening to the WHOLE album from beginning to end without stopping! That is rare to do for myself because usually I'll have to skip around to find the good songs, but Find Your Own WayHome proved to be different. I want to thank Kevin Cronin and the rest of REO Speedwagon for absolutely rekindling my faith in the WHOLE album concept because I honestly thought it was a lost cause these days.

So, I can see the light now when it comes to Kevin and REO Speedwagon now, they just want to make quality songs and albums for their fans and make a difference when they can. Mission accomplished in my book, Keep on rollin REO!

By Jimmy Rae