From: Kristen

    After seeing The Goo Goo Dolls for only my first time, on March 
12th, 1997 at the Arrowhead Pond of Anaheim, along with Bush, I spent 
the next couple of months still feeling VERY excited about the show 
I had seen and how they were everything and MORE than I had imagined 
they would be, to see live! I was pleasantly surprised while looking 
in the LA Times calendar section one night, and happened to go further 
and skim through the upcoming shows listed that were playing in Vegas 
and almost did a backflip when I saw that THE GOO GOO DOLLS would be 
playing at The Hard Rock Hotel within the next couple of weeks. 
   I have 2 different family members living in Vegas and there was 
just NO excuse for my missing this event since I could visit with 
each of them and even STAY at either place, while being able to see 
my NOW favorite band of all time.. ONCE MORE! I got on the phone to 
reserved tickets, which were SO MUCH cheaper than the ticket I had 
purchased for the GGD's/Bush show, and after 2 weeks passed, I was 
in Vegas, just a couple hours away from lining up at the door to see 
the band play in that very intimate atmosphere, I had heard that The 
Joint was!
   We had arrived early enough to be the 5th party in line, to enter 
the showroom giving me an ultimate choice of where I wanted to sit, 
or stand, since it was a general admission show. The Joint is arranged 
like a very small theater-house with an additional balcony besides a 
roomy dance floor area right in front of the stage. Beyond that..is an 
area of banquet tables, set up long-ways with enough seats for large
parties to sit, or several smaller ones, at each table. Up on the bal-
cony is the same set-up but for THIS show, it wasnt necessary, because 
the crowd just wasnt big enough to have needed the upper balcony, which 
meant MORE GOO FOR EACH audience member to view!!! I was THRILLED to 
see that there was going to be THAT FEW people there watching the show, 
unlike the capacity filled arena I had seen them at here in LA, just 
3 months prior to that. 
   I was much too excited to care who the opening act was before them 
and fortunately, they didnt play long at all since it appeared to me 
that almost everyone there was anxious for The Goo Goo Dolls to come 
on. When they did finally take the stage, I stood in the dance floor 
area, just a few feet from Johnnies place on stage, and I watched the 
entire show from that spot, only leaving a few times to go towards the 
back of the room to get another drink from the portable bar they had 
set up just yards away from the action. 
   The band was in their sometimes-very casual attire. Nothing fancy 
at all, since they were in such a casual town & hotel, and apparently 
treating this show as what *I* felt, that they thought of as 'a little 
side gig, while they were in town, relaxing, partying and having fun'!! 
I felt that my idea was correct, especially after Robbie had quoted 
mid-way through the show, that "it was good to be back in Vegas.. and 
that it holds a special significance to him, since only a year before, 
he had gotten married there!" (Unfortunatly, the marriage he referred 
to..has since ended, so Ive heard)
   The boys played an assortment of tunes, mostly off of Superstar 
Car Wash, and A Boy Named Goo, along with the riffs & semi-medleys 
worked in with some of the songs various solo's. The sounded tight, 
and were obviously having a BLAST! Johnny looked very 'European', 
wearing a red beret on his handsome head, along with a very 'comfort-
able' looking T-shirt. Robbie, of course was barefoot, cranking away 
on his bass, as Johnny pumped out the tunes on his guitar, that dis-
played that sticker with the words 'Mean people suck', which has al-
ways caught my fancy, and convinced me that they must be 3 of the 
most caring & friendly guys any working, touring band can be!!
   I wish I could elaborate more about the shows details, but I cant. 
Unfortunately.. the fact that 'that portable bar' I mentioned before, 
was so easy for us all to get to, made it much too easy for me, to 
have more drinks than I should have, and make the specific details of 
this show, a little harder to recall and tell about, right here... 
right now...after an entire years passing. :(
   A couple of things that I clearly remember well is, while walking 
out of the show to our car afterwards, I had overheard a couple of 
different peoples conversations among themselves and realized that so 
many of those people that had attended the show, had only done so, 
due to the fact that they just HAPPENED to be there (either in town 
or at the hotel) and had decided 'what the hell..lets go check out 
this band tonight', and unknowingly were seeing what WE ALL KNOW as 
such an ass-kickin band, that any of us would GIVE OUR RIGHT ARM to 
see in such a small, relaxed, uncrowded setting. THESE PEOPLE were 
just merely FILLING SOME OF THEIR WEEKEND TIME during their visit to 
Vegas!! 
   I heard two girls talking of how it was 'much louder' than they 
had expected and were so shocked and surpised to have discovered that 
The Goo Goo Dolls, and the 'loud' band they had just seen, were the 
ones responsible for the ballad they had heard, and had grown to love 
so much on the radio.....Name! 
I wanted to then, and STILL want to shake my head with pity for ANYONE 
who has not yet discovered what this band is all about, and the vast 
musical style that they're obviously so capable of, and how much raw, 
incredible TALENT that exists in this mere 3 PIECE GROUP!!
  However or whatever reasons any of those few hundred people had 
found themselves there for...whether they were 'just filling time', or 
were die-hard, serious Goo Goo Dolls fans, like myself..the band sure 
seemed to make an impact on everyone there, and every persons face that 
left The Joint that night, had a VERY SATISFIED LOOK!!  : )
  Well OF COURSE!! Afterall this is OUR GOO GOO DOLLS, Im speaking of!!!