Liberty Lies, Halestorm and Shinedown all on one ticket is a very strong lineup, and I had been looking forward to it for a very long time.
It is shame then that I managed to miss Liberty Lies completely. In truth due to unbelievable car parking conditions I nearly missed Halestorm! Thankfully though, I got in with just a few minutes to spare before Lzzy and the band stormed on stage and blasted through current single ‘Love Bites (And So Do I)‘. Continue reading
Before I start this review in earnest, I have to admit that I’ve not been a Snow Patrol fan for a while. I like the first two albums Music For Polar Bears and When It’s All Over…, and for the most part enjoyed Final Straw, but from then on I kind of lost interest and considered them to be a bit pedestrian, a bit of an everyman’s band and not one to instil much passion in their fan base. Based on tonight’s performance though, I might need to give that position a little bit of a rethink as they put on a cracking show to a hugely appreciative audience. Continue reading
Up until tonight I’ve never seen Mötley Crüe live. Though never their biggest fan, I’ve been listening to them for years and yet never spent the exuberant ticket price to go see them before. I’ve heard great things about their live shows in the past, and I’ve seen all sorts of stuff on the internet that I thought looked really cool, and so I built up the anticipation of a blinder of a gig. In my head, I’d already enjoyed the greatest show on Earth even before they come on stage.
But it’s said you should never meet your heroes, and although I wasn’t that lucky, I should have treated this event with the same trepidation as I believe I haven’t been so disappointed by a band in my entire life. Perhaps some of it was my own fault, but the dream just didn’t match the reality at all. Continue reading
This week is like the Musicscramble old man festival, in that we get to go home and have dinner and a nice kip between bands. Dec 5th saw Machine Head (read Gareth’s review here), and tonight the metal barrage continued with the “Defenders of the Faith III” tour featuring Insense, Rise to Remain, Ghost, In Flames and headlined by still-young-despite-being-around-for-ages metal powerhouse Trivium.
Sadly I didn’t make it in time for Insense, but I’m reliably informed by my erstwhile co-writer that they were pretty decent. I did walk into the venue near the beginning of Rise to Remain’s set however and I’m happy to say it was a pretty good start to my night. I’d seen them once before in a support slot at King Tut’s and they were honestly rather unremarkable, but since then they’ve released their debut full length “City of Vultures” and have come on in bounds since then. They were punchy and sharp and a million miles away from when I’d seen them before. They still lack that killer tune that could launch them into the stratosphere, but it was a worthy warm-up slot that got the reasonably small number of folk in the venue at this point going. Continue reading
The mammoth Machine Head Eighth Plague tour rolled into Glasgow tonight with a stellar four band line-up. Well almost stellar.
Darkest Hour arrived on stage at 1830 whilst the venue hardly had any visitors. This did nothing to deter them and especially lead singer John Henry jumping and running his way around the stage as if playing a stadium! They had a short set, but also ironically had the best sound setup in the venue of all bands this night. Darkest Hour were enjoyable and very competent but their music was not set the world alight stuff, which after seven albums is a real shame. Continue reading
Although not set up as such, tonight was a bit of a showcase for local Glasgow bands of varying ages and sounds with a crowd that appeared to be mostly made up of friends and family of the bands. Though all music stemmed from the rock garage, it was quite a mixture of generations, sounds and most notably, ability.
Opening were Revolution Reload, a junior three piece who seemed like they’re just learning the ropes. Musically they need practice and to decide on a particular sound. There was an uncomfortable mix of emo, pop-punk and electronica which didn’t sound particularly good and the singers’ voice was particularly poor which really didn’t help. Worst of all, they committed what I can only call a cardinal sin by covering Billy Idol’s classic “Rebel Yell”. Insulting the crowd for 4 minutes or so, they failed to even play parts of it, slowed some of it down and threw in some weird electronic noises here and there. Don’t do that again boys, for your own welfare. Safe to say, don’t give up your paper rounds yet. Continue reading
King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut in Glasgow was creaking at the seams on Saturday night. Expectation was high, and at 10pm when Rival Sons hit the stage it was suddenly all justified.
I have seen the band twice before; once at Sonisphere Festival in 2011 and a few weeks later supporting Judas Priest at the SECC. Rival Sons were really good those nights, but tonight they were the kings of their own domain playing their own headline show and the difference was obvious.
The band come from L.A., but don’t sound like what I’d argue the world has come to expect most L.A. rock bands sound like. It is more accurate to suggest their sound as akin to southern rock bands of the 70s, blues rock, and – though it is becoming cliché – Led Zeppelin. It is a fair comparison to Zeppelin, but they are so much more, definitely sound current, though it also needs to be said; there are worse bands to be compared to! Continue reading
Up until he took the stage I imagine Duff McKagan wasn’t having the best of days. Earlier in the day, the books he was due to be signing in store in the city didn’t arrive, and then it turns out that tonight’s gig hasn’t sold particularly well and has been demoted to the lower capacity sub-venue G2 underneath the 700 capacity main venue. It doesn’t sound particularly positive, but what it did result in was a cracking more intimate feeling gig.
G2 is a fairly small 350 capacity venue, and lacks the better acoustics of its bigger brother upstairs, but in a funny kind of way this actually benefited Loaded’s scuzzy sound. I missed first support Riot:Noise, but caught 2nd support Dear Superstar who seemed to be doing a trial run for a big sound in a small space. They sounded pretty poor and the crowd were inflicted with a combination of poor sound levelling (too much backing vocal, not enough main vocal, crappy guitar balance) and just generally unexciting songs.
