Extreme
Thursday, 31 July 2025, at 9:00 PM
Lignano Sabbiadoro / Arena Alpe Adria / Italy
Extreme don’t need much of an introduction. Their monster hit More Than Words is known by everyone — or rather, by literally everyone. A crew of exceptional musical talent, with one name that stands out for many: guitar god Nuno Bettencourt. The band hasn’t put out a huge number of albums over the years, and lengthy gaps between releases have been part of the deal. But thanks above all to their first three records, which have grown into bona fide hard rock classics over time, the name Extreme has stayed firmly in the sights of fans who never stopped following them. There’s another factor behind why we’d missed Extreme on European stages for a good while — they’re known for their musical uniqueness. The genre detours woven through their compositions, from funk to flirtations with pop rock, are bold yet thoughtfully integrated, giving the songs a distinctive sheen, tone, and character — and the band a musical identity all their own. In short, Extreme are simply one of music’s great originals.
The band released an excellent sixth studio album in 2023, aptly titled “Six.” They’d already done a European run the previous year, and the bravest Slovenian rockers made the trek all the way to Milan for them. But a band with a reputation as a jaw-dropping live act eventually confirmed a show close to the Slovenian border — and as part of yet another European Thicker Than Blood tour, no less. The venue is one we always love heading to: Arena Alpe Adria in the resort town of Lignano Sabbiadoro!
But this one wasn’t without its complications either. It had been one of those rare days that stayed dry through the afternoon and into the evening, which felt hugely encouraging. Even so, we found ourselves stuck on the Milan motorway between the San Giorgio di Nogaro and Latisana exits for over an hour and a half, in a solid traffic jam caused by the wreckage of an overturned truck that, for good measure, had also been burning furiously. You could tell — the tarmac at the crash site was visibly buckled. So, in late July, when concerts in our region are literally everywhere, getting to gigs has become a genuine mix of nerve-wracking tension and adrenaline-fuelled scrambling, where you’re just happy to arrive at all, even if the venue is barely 100 km from home. Whether it’s pouring non-stop or something else derails your plans entirely.
This time was a similar story — just in dry conditions. We arrived at the last possible moment, right as Extreme were taking the stage. And the band delivered a truly exceptional show. They came out in outstanding form — I’d go so far as to say remarkably well-preserved. Gary Cherone was on fire, untouchable, not far off from climbing the stage rig altogether. His voice remains enormous; the man holds onto that stage swagger, his charisma is infectious, and as a showman he’s brilliant at working the crowd, which ate out of his hand all night. The rhythm section of Pat Badger / Kevin Figueiredo was crushing — cannon-like and precise. The sonic contrasts were extraordinary. Badger’s bass dug and carved wildly, which came through especially on the funk-fuelled excursions into Extreme’s musical universe, and it really lodged itself in the ear during the iconic Get The Funk Out near the close of the show. Nuno Bettencourt — one of the world’s finest rock guitarists, who for years has also been earning his keep in Rihanna’s camp — was the main event of the night. He’s also the most talkative member of the band, tossing out a solid stack of entertaining banter throughout the show. A proper raconteur, no equal. Pure theatre, all of it. His guitar playing remains poetry in every sense: flawless execution, extraordinary control, mindful precision. All of that was crowned by the centrepiece acoustic section, where Nuno simply confirmed his musical greatness.
The band served up a hefty dose of material from their latest achievement “Six,” which in terms of song character slots seamlessly into the band’s classic era, alongside tracks from their commercially far most successful effort — the second studio album “Pornograffitti” — with which they also opened the concert, firing two heavy hitters in quick succession: It (‘s a Monster) and Decadence Dance.
A standout stretch of the show came with the acoustic trio of Hole Hearted, the ballad-leaning “Waiting For The Punchline” track Midnight Express, and the evergreen rock ballad most people had been waiting for — More Than Words. The harmonising between Cherone’s vocal and Bettencourt was exceptional. Moving, even — straight back to the peak MTV era. At that point, honestly, Extreme could have just kept playing the rest of the set acoustically. The filigree precision of those nimble, quick fingers, all the detail Bettencourt threaded through passages of the songs — culminating in the harmonics on the way out of More Than Words, which he accented with a tremolo so that the final note slowly faded for a few seconds after the classic ended.
The playful tricks that Extreme bring to their shows are no longer a novelty — they pull them out regularly, and this night was no different, tossing a few into the set. More than once they had the crowd fooled by announcing a song and then launching into a well-known classic by someone else — Queen, Led Zeppelin — before suddenly pivoting to their own track. Nuno once again cast a spell on the crowd in one of those signature Extreme show moments, pulling out Flight of the Wounded Bumblebee near the end. And he wasn’t about to leave Eddie out of it either, locking into the Van Halen shrapnel piece Eruption during his segment of the set.
After Get The Funk Out, Cherone asked the crowd if they’d mind if the band stuck around on stage a little longer. That meant we were heading into the obligatory encore. They kicked it off with the revved-up track from the new album “Six” called RISE, followed by a short address from Nuno, who said that what they were about to do had never been performed in quite this way before and that he had no idea how it was all going to work. In the grand finale, the band strung together a medley of three Ozzy Osbourne classics as a tribute to the Prince of Darkness. The crowd came fully alive one last time, and when Extreme left the stage, people still couldn’t quite believe the show was actually over. An hour and three quarters. Intense beyond all limits. Sound, crowd connection, performance power — at a truly top-tier, I’ll go ahead and say the highest possible level. The way the greatest rock craftsmen do it.
Whether a similar opportunity to catch Extreme will come around soon is an open question. Alongside all the brilliant playing and the new, intoxicating concert experience that deserves nothing but the highest marks, the one shadow cast over the Lignano show was the dismal turnout. Near-empty stands and a floor barely half full. That’s the only real shame. Given that this band has navigated lengthy hiatuses throughout their career and that their albums move very slowly, it genuinely raises the question of when another European tour will follow this one.
Photos: Aleš Podbrežnik
Author: Edita Klemen & Aleš Podbrežnik
Extreme – setlist:
1. It (‘s a Monster)
2. Decadence Dance
3. #REBEL
4. Rest in Peace
5. Am I Ever Gonna Change
6. THICKER THAN BLOOD
7. Play With Me (We Will Rock You intro)
8. OTHER SIDE OF THE RAINBOW
9. Hole Hearted
10. Midnight Express
11. More Than Words
12. Cupid’s Dead (Cupid’s Sam Cooke intro)
13. BANSHEE (Fat Bottomed Girls intro)
14. Flight of the Wounded Bumblebee
15. Get the Funk Out
16. RISE
17. I Don’t Know / Bark at the Moon / Crazy Train (Ozzy Osbourne tribute medley)
Sijajen koncert in ja – žal na pol prazna arena:(