Live Review: Nicotine Dolls @ Union Stage — 5/11/25

May 22, 2025

Nicotine Dolls thrilled the audience at Union Stage recently on their An Attempt at Romantic Tour. I was there to witness the entire thing. But it wasn’t my first encounter with the Dolls. In fact, I covered their last show in DC, at Union Stage, almost 11 months ago! You can check that review out right here. But this was anything but a repeat.

At Union Stage on May 11, the evening began with opening act Lostcrowboy. He came out by himself, armed with just an acoustic guitar. His set ended up being hilarious. He played a mix of his own originals, which were great, and covers suggested by the audience; many of which he didn’t know. That back and forth banter, plus the courage to be honest in front of a crowd of strangers, definitely won me over.

When the Nicotine Dolls’ set began, singer Sam Cieri (who had recently celebrated a birthday) came out alone with his acoustic guitar and started singing “Have a Little Faith in Me.” The band soon joined him and the show jumped into gear. The packed house matched the band’s energy.

Nicotine Dolls is made up of singer Sam Cieri, guitarist John Hays, bass player John Merritt, drummer Abel Tabares, and sax player/guitarist/tour manager Dan Tracy. If you haven’t heard the band before, the best way to describe their sound is if the Goo Goo Dolls were fronted by a naughty Michael Bolton.

Watch the official music video for “You Won’t Have Me” by Nicotine Dolls on YouTube:

As the set progressed, the stories between songs came fast and furious. A few songs in, Sam took a moment to talk about his grandmother. She was a force in his life and his biggest supporter. She passed away just prior to last year’s show and it still hits Sam pretty hard. He talked about her incredible gift of storytelling, which he definitely inherited from her. “The hardest part,” he said about his recent birthday, “was waking up and there was no phone call from her.” It was a touching moment that preceded their song “Next to Me.”

The band brought the mood up over the next several songs. The show is mostly original music but there are some well placed covers sprinkled into the setlist. The first of these is their pretty faithful version of Peter Gabriel’s song “In Your Eyes.” It was a highlight for me last year, as it was this go around. It’s a song well-suited to Sam’s voice.

Nicotine Dolls played songs from their entire catalog; some new, some older. When they were setting up to play a cover of Goo Goo Dolls’ “Iris,” Sam told a story about meeting the singer, John Rzeznik. John tried to make small talk and Sam’s response to just about everything was “Nicotine Dolls.”

As the set wound down, they wrapped up with “How Do You Love Me.” Before starting to play, Sam informed the audience that it was the last song, then they would go off stage for a little bit, the crowd would chant, and they would come back and play an encore. He even gave away the songs!

The crowd followed orders and Sam came out alone with his acoustic. But he walked right off the stage and into the middle of the crowd. He said he was going to sing a song that we all knew. Even if we thought we didn’t know it, WE KNEW IT! He did a stunning, intimate version of Cher’s “Believe,” and everyone knew it!

The rest of the band emerged to finish the show with two more songs: “What Makes You Sad” (their most well-known original) and Tina Turner’s “The Best.” When you see a band multiple times in a relatively short period, you tend to think you’ll see the same show. While there were some similarities, it was definitely not a carbon copy of the 2024 show. But even if it was, I wouldn’t really care. I’d go just to hear that voice.

Setlist