Well, all that $69.50 could buy anyway, plus a midget master of ceremonies, pyrotechnics, strippers, naughty nurses and more smoke effects than a special evening with the guys from Cypress Hill.

The boys in the band — drummer Tommy Lee, bassist Nikki Sixx, guitarist Mick Mars and vocalist Vince Neil — called the two hour, 18-song show and tour the "Carnival of Sins." It wasn't exactly that until the fire-dancing girls with pasties, stilt walkers and more midgets entered stage left at the end. But it tried real hard.

A not-quite sellout Blaisdell Arena crowd showed up to check out that rarest of Honolulu phenomena these days: an actual live rock show. Another attraction? Seeing if four should-be-dead-thanks-to-their-excesses musical fools could still rock in the politically correct '00s.

I knew the answer to the latter when a pair of laceblack panties flew past my seat in the nosebleed section.

The band opened with "Shout at the Devil," immediately running through a set of high velocity, speed-metal-lite screamers from its early years that was pure sloppy fun. Flowing out of Neil's high-pitched, though noticeably shot vocal chords, the chorus to "Too Fast For Love" sounded more like "too fa fu lah." Neil's annoying vocal slurring was in effect on "Ten Seconds To Love," "Looks That Kill," "Live Wire" and other songs all night.

Not that any of that mattered to the mostly late 20s through fortysomething-aged crowd who wore all the right '80s clothes — bandanas, leather, rock tees, torn jeans and even a couple of pith helmets — and knew all the words even to dreck like "Red Hot."

Basic rapport between the band and the excitable crowd early on went something like this:

Neil: "Who likes the old (expletive)?"

Crowd: (Roar!)

Neil: "Old (expletive) it is, then, (expletive)(expletive)!"

Neil, Sixx and Lee rode on stage on a trio of loud choppers before tearing into "Girls, Girls, Girls." A stripper trotted a midget on a leash before "Don't Go Away Mad (Just Go Away)." Monster ceiling-aimed fire and pyrotechnic blasts often rode Lee's equally monstrous beats.

Lee, who always got the loudest applause of the night whenever he did practically anything, went on about chilling vacation-style on the local beaches and his appreciation of local illegal horticulture. Sixx talked the masses into screaming and bouncing up and down loud enough to beat ruling tour champion city Detroit.

None of those adolescent antics, though, could match the spectacle of a hunched top-hat-and-overcoat-wearing Mars actually working the stage.

Suffering from a degenerative disease that is slowly fusing the bones in his spine, Mars prowled as best he could, rarely moving anything as fast as his nimble fingers. Watching him carve out masterful ear-shattering solos and multiple power chords using only whatever muscles were needed to get the job done was more impressive than practically anything Sixx, Neil and even the drum-murdering Lee mustered all night.

The crowd ate up the Crue's heavy-on-the-hits set and asked for more. "Home Sweet Home" was pure old school, with hundreds of lighters — not cell phone screens — illuminating the arena. "Kickstart My Heart," "Dr. Feelgood" and "Wild Side" had the crowd hitting notes Neil no longer could.

And one couldn't help getting a lump in the throat watching the once-feuding Lee and Neil secretly joking and sharing shots of Jagermeister in the darkness behind the drum kit while Sixx took his turn addressing the crowd late in the show.

Why the Crue chose to end the carnival with their lackluster cover of the Sex Pistols "Anarchy In The U.K." is beyond my comprehension. But everyone around me seemed to appreciate those aforementioned fire-dancing girls with pasties, stilt walkers and midgets that went along with it.

"Have a Motley Christmas, and a merry Crue year!" Lee yelled, drumsticks held high, after the encore.

Sure, Tommy. Just take it easy on the Jager shots, dude. We hear Vince has been to rehab.