After having nothin’ however an excellent time final summer season, Bret Michaels can be again this yr with Parti-Gras 2.0, a five-act package deal that kicks off July 12 in Noblesville, Indiana, and performs six dates throughout July and August.
Becoming a member of the Poison frontman and solo artist this summer season can be former Foreigner frontman (and up to date Rock & Roll Corridor of Fame nominee) Lou Gramm, ex-Eagles guitarist Don Felder and Twisted Sister frontman Dee Snider, together with nation singer Chris Janson, who Michaels joined for an episode of CMT Crossroads in December.
“We had such an ideal expertise final yr,” Michaels tells UCR. “What I feel makes it come collectively, apart from the friendship and the chemistry of the [performers], is simply the music, the timeless basic hits and plenty of vitality. It is hit songs. Folks really feel like they’re having a good time. They’re singing. There is not any toilet breaks. It is only a nice night time from begin to end.”
Michaels even has a reasonably clear thought of how the exhibits will run. “You bought Don Felder opening up the entire night with nothing however Eagles hits – ‘Lodge California,’ ‘Life within the Quick Lane.’ After which Dee Snider comes on stage together with his hits and joins and Lou Gramm singing all the nice Foreigner stuff — I am unable to even depend the quantity of hits — after which Chris and finally by the tip of the night time we select some songs we are able to all do collectively and make it, once more as I mentioned final yr, a celebration of all of the followers, the bands, the music — everyone within the constructing.”
READ MORE: When Poison’s New Guitarist Gave Them Their Final Hit, ‘Stand’
Not like final yr’s Parti-Gras, which included Night time Ranger, Jefferson Starship, Sugar Ray’s Mark McGrath and onetime Journey singer Steve Augeri, this yr’s version will nod to Michaels’ dalliances with nation music by that includes Janson, who Michaels considers a type of kindred spirit and “a very nice good friend.”
“After we received to fulfill up and hang around earlier than we began filming [Crossroads], he advised me the primary tune he and his band discovered to play was [Poison’s] ‘Speak Soiled to Me.’ I mentioned, ‘Properly, we gotta try this, and that you must sing it.’ And ‘Purchase Me a Boat’ is considered one of his songs that is on my Parti-Gras mixtape. So we shaped an amazingly superior friendship.” CMT can be re-airing Crossroads a number of instances throughout the subsequent week, beginning at 8 p.m. EST on Feb. 13.
Michaels additionally has a powerful relationship with Snider, with whom he shares a birthday (March 15, eight years aside), and he phrases Gramm “an inspiration” and affect from his earliest days as a music fan. “As you see with Bret Michaels and Mates…I’ve made buddies, I am gonna say this, 99.9 p.c of the time. Possibly as soon as in awhile you meet somebody and that chemistry simply does not gel, nevertheless it’s seldom and I do not even keep in mind at this level. Most people I get together with and have a good time.”
Michaels says different parts of Parti-Gras will stay in place, such because the get together beads and bandanas distributed to parti-goers, and having contest winners benefit from the present from an on-stage Tiki hut. He additionally revealed one other component that helps create the right spirit on the exhibits. “I received right down to make it odor good,” Michael explains, “I imply actually ensuring our hazers had coconut rum so that you felt such as you have been on the island. Folks have been like, ‘It smells good up right here!’ Yeah, dumping a bit coconut rum into the hazers, it simply smells good. It smells such as you’re hanging out in Florida or one of many Caribbean islands.”
Hit After Hit
However whereas Michaels launched a brand new single and video, the nostalgic “Again within the Day,” earlier than final yr’s Parti-Gras he is not planning something comparable this time. “When folks come to Parti-Gras we maintain telling them ‘all hits, no filler,’ and we’re simply attempting to fireplace out hit after hit so the followers can have an ideal night time,” Michaels says.
He is planning different particular person Parti-Gras exhibits throughout the remainder of the yr, and Michaels can be waiting for 2025, when Poison is plotting one other reunion to observe up its jaunt on the 2022 Stadium Tour with Def Leppard, Motley Crue and Joan Jett & the Blackhearts. “I feel it is gonna be nice,” Michaels predicts. “I feel everybody can be unbelievably excited, like we have been once we did the Stadium Tour. It is about each two or three years and we get collectively and simply have a good time. We actually sit up for being collectively now.”
Tickets for Parti-Gras 2.0 go on sale at 10 a.m. EST on Feb. 16, with pre-sale alternatives and VIP packages accessible through BretMichaels.com. The complete 2024 itinerary may be discovered beneath.
Parti-Gras 2.0 2024 Present Dates
July 12 – Noblesville, IN @ Ruoff Music Heart
July 13 – Burgettstown, PA @ Pavillion at Star Lake
August 3 – Atlanta, GA @ Ameris Amphitheatre
August 23 – Detroit, MI @ Pine Knob
August 30 – Holmdel, NJ @ PNC Financial institution Arts Heart
August 31 – Gilford, NH @ Financial institution of New Hampshire Pavilion
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In the identical approach that ducktails outlined the ’50s and bell bottoms grew to become shorthand for the ’70s, neon-lit sartorial selections may be firmly positioned within the Reagan years.
Gallery Credit score: Nick DeRiso
