“It was a proper s***hole,” Bryan Adams was laughing Friday night, walking us through his localized origin story. Just 22 at the time, Adams was playing a hotel bar — the long defunct Riv Rock Room off Calgary Trail — when, no way man, “That night, in walked Mick Jones from Foreigner.”

Their conversation led Adams and his band to support the Double Vision-eers on tour, which the now 58-year-old singer asserted, “Right here, in this town, we got to see it started.”

Some 75 million records later, it was certainly the best version of throwing on a local hockey jersey I’ve seen in a while, and heaps more sincere.

And you do get the feeling Adams felt something special at this Rogers Place gig — down to the fact he gave Edmonton one more encore song, his very early Lonely Nights, than he has so far on his months-long European/Canadian Ultimate Tour.Before this, over two hours in the big room with the Garth Brooks banner and that guy who dresses like Wolverine in the front row, Adams and the boys played no less than 28 other swings and hits in front of a single Cineplex movie screen, bearing the confidence of five groomsmen who’d ditched their ties and partners and were bro dancing to, well, songs like Run to You and Summer of ’69.

Which, of course, he and the Dudes of Leisure dutifully offered, the latter song one of a few full-on singalongs where the chipper star stepped back and let the audience go mass karaoke.

He even moved the stand up to the edge and turned the mic towards all the bellowing Boomers and aging X’ers dreaming of long-ago sweaty junior high gym dances under the mirrorball.

Bryan Adams rocking the downtown arena Friday night.PHOTO BY IAN KUCERAK Postmedia

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He didn’t need to, either. Adams’ gravelly wail is perfectly preserved from the Reagan-Mulroney years, above all other aspects carrying the night.His leaping, hugging antics with the longtime band including guitarist Keith Scott, who subbed in for Tina Turner, supplied further highlights.And let’s not forget those 40 spinning and choreographed LED “neon” tubes overhead, which dropped thrillingly fast at times, independently or in a shifting sheet formation.

Bryan Adams and guitarist Keith Scott at Rogers Place Friday night.PHOTO BY IAN KUCERAK /Postmedia

Charming, straightforward and — despite the swearing — remarkably wholesome, the show took the odd square visual chance.

But it was actually amazing being dominated with the giant word DIE onscreen like some Nine Inch Nails show during 18 Til I Die — a song that also smelled more than a little of Alice Cooper.

Adams’ crowd seemed just as satisfied with early, planet-dominating hits like Heaven, Cuts Like a Knife, Somebody and It’s Only Love as his, shall we say, less punk soundtrack work — including Have You Ever Really Loved a Woman?, Everything I Do (I Do It for You) and All for Love, the Rod Stewart/Sting collaboration with which he’s been ending the night on tour.

No One Night Love Affair, damn it — but so be it.Given Adams’ activism and philanthropy, it was actually pleasantly surprising to not have him grind the evening to a halt and talk about his causes — which you can and should look up elsewhere. Instead, the vegan singer told the story of how he convinced his mom to give him his going-nowhere education money for a used piano,

Twins Katie Schwirtz-Fahlman and Carly Schwirtz-Hallam pose with Bryan Adams at his show. PHOTO BY SUPPLIED

Speaking of wholesome, reading audience signs out loud a la Brooks, Adams pulled a set of twins up on stage for selfies, his charm and photographic skill kicking in as he turned them all around for a better picture with the crowd behind them. “I’m not doing that for everybody,” he smiled. “I’d be here all night!”

Besides some rockabilly, there were a handful of times where I felt like we were actually at a hot country show, quickly realizing I’d gotten the chicken and egg mixed up — modern country’s proclivity since the ’90s to ditch actual country music for ’80s power pop … well, here we were at the source of that sound. The band played The Only Thing That Looks Good On Me Is You, a perfect example of this crossover reality down to its title.

Given Adams’ Foreigner story, it was a odd his opening act was a Monty Python-y gag animation of himself shirtless eating flies over AM radio jams. And instead of climaxing under fireworks and confetti, he ended the show in a rather subdued manner: mostly solo acoustic. But the unexpected worked.

With Gary Breit joining him on keys, Adams introduced the Edmonton-special Lonely Nights as being off a record that “got me out of the s***hole clubs into the better s***hole clubs.”

Whether those were best days of his life or not, they certainly got him to a place of gratitude you can really feel all these years later — riding the absolute simplest of songs through the age when Canadian rock of all things dominated the world.