RSFCO

Set list:
Brown Sugar - Start Me Up - If You Can't Rock Me - Don't Stop - All Down the Line - Angie - You Can't Always Get What You Want - Monkey Man - Can't You Hear Me Knocking - Tumbling Dice - Slipping Away - Before They Make Me Run - Sympathy For The Devil - It's Only Rock'n'Roll - Little Red Rooster - Midnight Rambler - Gimme Shelter - Honky Tonk Women - Street Fighting Man - Jumping Jack Flash - Satisfaction.

Mick came out after Brown Sugar and asked if the Superbowl was going to be at the stadium next year. All the Texans yelled back, and Mick said "We're here to break it in!"

There was a guy behind us yelling Paint It Black between songs, but he dissaooeared when they started playing You Can't Always Get What You Want! Pretty funny timing.

A lot of people had cameras. We took some pictures with a disposable. We were a little far away for that little camera, but can send you them. When we were leaving we saw a guy two rows behind us with a real camera and a huge lens.

Keith was also great. He had a different guitar for Satisfaction. It had a magenta neck and the body was stainless steel (Stones Planet note: the guitar was a gift from Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top). Every song was flawless. Well maybe there was something we didn't notice, but if there was a flaw, who would care?

After the B Stage, Michael said they haven't played Street Fightin Man, Jumpin Jack Flash, or Honky tonk Woman. Daniel said, no Satisfaction either!

After the B stage they came back with Gimme Shelter. It was the best version yet. Lisa and Mick did a wonderful job. Then they played Honky Tonk Woman like it was their last song. It was getting near 11:00. Then came Street Fightin Man, and the crowd went wild. The Stones really worked that one, and we were thinking THIS must be it. But Jumpin Jack Flash started and the intensity they played THAT one with made us think, OK, that was it. But they didn't take bows when they left, and Michael said they must be coming back with Satisfaction.

So Keith comes out with the new guitar..well, you know what happens then. SATISFACTION! They took a bow after that and we knew it was over. We started out, got out of the aisle and walked back to the exit during the fireworks. We had to walk around the stadium, but Mike had a good parking spot and we got out early. Since we went the back way, traffic was not bad.

Stones show that time is on their side

Aging rockers make history at Reliant

The first time the Rolling Stones played Houston, they took the stage at rickety Sam Houston Coliseum in 1966 and opened with a song that was an oldie even then, Not Fade Away. They closed the show with what many still consider the greatest rock song ever, Satisfaction.

Not fade away? Not hardly. Thirty-seven years later on a chilly Saturday night, the now legendary, aristocratic Rolling Stones lit a fuse on shiny new Reliant Stadium with a performance that fans will talk about for another three decades.

Satisfaction? Just ask the 46,000-plus fans who jumped out of their seats when Keith Richards slinked onstage and blasted the opening chords of Brown Sugar, while Mick Jagger broke the rushing record at Reliant Stadium with mad dashes from sideline to sideline.

You couldn't take your eyes off these tiny rockers pushing 60 years old. How can they be that thin, that athletic?

In Richards case, that alive? If even half the stories of his drug exploits are true, he's done more needlepoint than Martha Stewart. Saturday night, a beaming, almost healthy-looking Richards threw himself on the floor, rocked into Start Me Up, and kissed his guitar. He laughed and threw guitar picks into the audience. He had silver charms and gadgets tied in his hair. He looked wonderful.

He'll outlive us all.

Jagger bounced like a puppet. Charlie Watts pounded his drums mercilessly, and Ron Wood hit all the right notes and never dropped his cigarette. Science needs to study these men.

Ann Wai was a teenager when she waited in line for hours to see the Stones at Sam Houston Coliseum in 1966. "We sat in front of the stage. It was one of the most memorable times of my life. Mick had incredible magnetism."

Wai is a grandmother now.

And Jagger is a grandfather. So? The Rolling Stones are still acting like kids.

Saturday night's concert drew the rich and mighty of Houston. Pro athletes, newscasters, politicians and business leaders were scattered throughout the crowd. Continental Airlines CEO Gordon Bethune wore a Harley-Davidson jeans jacket in a $350 seat on Richards' side, the fun side, of the stage.

Yeah, those people are rich, now. Wait until they get their credit card bill from Ticketmaster.

Many fans bought Stones souvenir shirts and put them right on. The price of loyalty has gone up, though.

Back in '66, you could have taken your family of six, plus the family of six next door, to see the Stones for the same money it took to buy a T-shirt Saturday night.

David Sander owns a bicycle store, but he wasn't selling Schwinns Saturday night.

"I put a sign on my door that said, `Closed -- went to see geriatric rock `n' rollers.' I've seen the Rolling Stones every time they've been here."

His only problem with the concert this time?

"Most of the women here are my age."

His wife of 21 years will just love reading that.

All photos above © Linda Harris and her son Daniel, with big thanks!!

Stones fans get their licks

Reliant Stadium show a classic

The Rolling Stones have spent the first four-plus months of the Forty Licks World Tour mixing hits and album tracks from a four-decade recording career. On Saturday it was Houston's turn to get "licked" as the Stones took over Reliant Stadium for the first concert geared to equal the enormity of the Houston Texans' new home.

Leading into the show it was hard not to sift through the old albums and imagine a dream set list.

How about they open the show with Richards striking the distinctive three notes of Start Me Up, followed by the stressful pacing of Under My Thumb for an early one-two punch. After that they could dig way back for the country romp Let It Bleed and maybe get psychedelic with something like Ruby Tuesday.

Houston's show did not unfold this way, but once it started it didn't matter. As proved by the release of last year's two-disc greatest hits album Forty Licks, the first Stones compilation to span the group's entire career, these rock 'n' roll legends have enough timeless classics to shape a show in countless ways.

The 46,000-plus who came out for show also had an extra dose of adrenaline working for them. They were on hand to first hear what rock `n' roll sounds like under the retractable roof.

Few were disappointed. The notes were crisp as they were absorbed by the concrete walls -- not blaring guitar din as they might have been in cozy arenas. The huge floor area certainly gave the Stones space to spread out the contents of 33 semis full of concert gear.

Those who saw the Stones concert live from Madison Square Garden in New York last week caught a glimpse of the enormity of the main set and satellite stage separated by a bridge across the middle of the audience. That was the indoor set-up adapted to a basketball court. The expanded football field set-up stretched nearly 200 feet across the width of the stadium (the grass had been pulled leaving a concrete base), and shot steel and light fixtures more than 85 feet in the air.

Production director Jake Berry, who has been building stages for the Stones since 1994, says the set-up was bigger than the traveling amusement parks used on the Voodoo Lounge and Bridges To Babylon tours.

The Stones, however, are bigger than life and command this much stage. Huge banks of screens helped sell the image, but Mick Jagger, guitarists Keith Richards and Ron Wood, drummer Charlie Watts, and their nine-piece band could fill the stage without video accessories.

As if the dozens of banks of lights weren't enough, the Stones walked onstage to a massive strobe of blue and red lights. The group returned fire with a rapid drumbeat that steadily grew stronger while light units propelled up the stage wall.

Richards started the show with a signature guitar lick, the multiple chords of Brown Sugar calling the quartet on stage and the concert to order. Jagger, dressed in a gold, waist-length jacket, immediately whipped into his jive rooster walk to the refrains of Bobby Keys' saxophone.

Brown Sugar was followed by Richards opening up the three vibrating notes of Start Me Up to form an opening one-two punch better than imagined. As Jagger dodged and moved, the large billboard overhead gave way to four massive, mobile video screens. Fans in the fourth deck of the south end zone now didn't have to worry about being able to see the stage.

The Stones promised rarities on this tour, but the opening hour was a hit compilation every bit as potent as Forty Licks that seemed to gain momentum with each new choice. The ballad Angie, anchored by Richards' Spanish-influenced acoustic guitar, built to the frustration of You Can't Always Get What You Want.

Trombone player Mike Davis' melancholy prelude echoed the song's despair before Richards' bluesy steel or Jagger's vocals ever had a chance. The energy coming from the audience seemed to charge Jagger. As the song headed for a close, he sped up the tempo with a hand-clap beat while a trio sang falsetto behind him.

Christening the football stadium as a concert venue also appeared to pique Jagger's interest.

"Is it true they're going to bring the Super Bowl here?" he asked a cheering audience.

Eventually, the Stones dotted the set with rarities. During the tour, the Stones have often dedicated nights to certain albums, delving deeper into its tracks than other albums'.

At press time the show was only half over, and not all secrets were known. But the set was already perfect. Not because it was the one I would have chosen, but because it was the one the Stones chose for Houston. Jagger even wore a cowboy hat to introduce the band.

Reliant Stadium proved itself a worthy concert venue, obviously lacking intimacy but definitely an acoustical improvement over the neighboring Astrodome.

After 40 years, the Stones have become an act that moms and dads can enjoy with children (and grandchildren).

Once considered dangerous and a corrupting influence on youth, the Stones are now spectacular family entertainment.