Thursday, July 17, 2008
Let's Get, Let's Get, Let's Get, Let's Get Rocked!
Walking through the front door of a venue to see a bigger crowd than expected and a guy with a Flying V guitar jumping up and down to end the first song of the set is always a good sign. It is pretty easy to end up seeing a band enough times to get to know them fairly well, even if you don't especially like them, and Thunder is one such.
I have nothing against Thunder, and we're closing in on double figures, so when I see them it can go one of two ways. If it's been a while I tend to think that I'd forgotten how good they can be, and if it hasn't then I'm usually reminded more about why I wouldn't describe myself as a particular fan. I checked, and it has been a couple of years, so I was hoping for good things. Danny Bowes must have the fitness levels of your average fitness instructor the way he bounces around, and you can see that he, Luke and GaryHarry have been working together for a very long time. Love Walked In is great, Low Life In High Places remains a classic lost rock single, and IIIIIIIIIII Love You More Than Rock N Roll is both a fine line and a storming way to end a set. On the other hand, the cover of Gimme Some Lovin' remains ill-advised when there are many better songs of their own they could be doing, and the wisdom of extended bouts of back and forth crowd participation is perhaps questionable in a 45 minute, third on the bill set. Whatever, fine bunch of chaps and I wish them well.
Another band I've never been especially close to is Whitesnake. Coverdale is an easy target, but he's got the best perm money can buy and in Reb Beach and Doug Aldrich he has a fine pair of guitar players. Three of the first five songs being off the new album (I think) is pushing anyone's patience, though dedicating Love Ain't No Stranger to the recently deceased Mel Galley is a nice touch. In the latter half of the show he stops using profanity in the sort of industrial quantities I normally do (note to self: every third word being bleepable looks really trying too hard to be down with the kids ridiculous in your average late fifty-something), and the unfamiliar/new songs go away. Ain't No Love Crying In The Heart Of the Shadow Of The Blues In The City, Here I Go In My Leather Strides Again and other well known 'snake classics turn up, but they come with too much raspy squealing and the melody coming from what seems suspiciously like one of the four other vocal mikes on the stage. Sure, he's an engaging frontman and he has a fine pedigree, but I don't feel cheated that I never saw the show before, and I'm not rushing to find out where I can repeat the experience. It's a box ticked, an expression I can imagine Old Cov using himself.
Doug and Dave - see flickr for a few more.
Def Leppard, on the other hand, is a band I've wished I'd seen some time before. I had a ticket for the Hysteria tour but ended up not able to go, and with the whole saga of Rick's arm, Steve Clark's untimely death and so on, they've been somewhere around my consciousness for a long time. Joe Elliot is perhaps the rock Simon Le Bon these days, but that's really no bad thing, and everything you could want to hear is belted out with gusto. Photograph is a personal highlight, for more than one reason. Viv Campbell and Phil Collen provide an ongoing lowlight, with their bare chested man boob competition, which lasts at least an hour of the set. Really, no thanks. Sav looks like a young Duff McKagan, and seems the least aged of the lot of them, and watching Rick drum every time he is on the video screen is half intriguing, half inspiring. Having spotted the amount of other vocal supporting Coverdale, it strikes me the Def Lep sound is actually not so dissimilar, but their reputation is less built around a single voice.
By the end of the show I'm waiting for Let's Get Rocked to finish so I can get home to bed, but three classic rock bands for that price can't be bad. I'm bound to end up running into Thunder again sooner or later, and Def Leppard coming within striking distance would definitely tempt me out again, so not a bad night of rock, all told.
Def Leppard, on the other hand, is a band I've wished I'd seen some time before. I had a ticket for the Hysteria tour but ended up not able to go, and with the whole saga of Rick's arm, Steve Clark's untimely death and so on, they've been somewhere around my consciousness for a long time. Joe Elliot is perhaps the rock Simon Le Bon these days, but that's really no bad thing, and everything you could want to hear is belted out with gusto. Photograph is a personal highlight, for more than one reason. Viv Campbell and Phil Collen provide an ongoing lowlight, with their bare chested man boob competition, which lasts at least an hour of the set. Really, no thanks. Sav looks like a young Duff McKagan, and seems the least aged of the lot of them, and watching Rick drum every time he is on the video screen is half intriguing, half inspiring. Having spotted the amount of other vocal supporting Coverdale, it strikes me the Def Lep sound is actually not so dissimilar, but their reputation is less built around a single voice.
By the end of the show I'm waiting for Let's Get Rocked to finish so I can get home to bed, but three classic rock bands for that price can't be bad. I'm bound to end up running into Thunder again sooner or later, and Def Leppard coming within striking distance would definitely tempt me out again, so not a bad night of rock, all told.Labels: Def Leppard, gigs, Thunder, Whitesnake
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That's brought back a few memories.
Somewhere, I've got a couple of issues of a magazine called "Nite Life"; a What's On guide for Bournemouth and Poole which my then-landlord tried to get off the ground.
Issue 2 contained my review of the BIC gig I supect you refer to as well as my review of one gig we definitely have in common - The Grip at Mr C's.
Somewhere, I've got a couple of issues of a magazine called "Nite Life"; a What's On guide for Bournemouth and Poole which my then-landlord tried to get off the ground.
Issue 2 contained my review of the BIC gig I supect you refer to as well as my review of one gig we definitely have in common - The Grip at Mr C's.
The Grip were there twice - once in about May and once in November, the latter being the one where they were selling that single. Other particularly memorable shows there were Chrome Molly, Briar, Girlschool, Redbeards From Texas, Tigertailz and the last incarnation of the Tygers Of Pan Tang with Jon Deverill, as well as the mighty Wolfsbane doing several shows, one of which in particular I know lives on their memories too.
This is just from memory, but I can check the list for everything I saw there easily enough. Two other things stick out in my mind, Samson being rather poor, and that guy with the winklepicker pixie boots who was the only one who'd ever trouble the dance floor when the band was not on stage. Oh, and watching the video for Crazy Train on that projector screen.
Presumably that wasn't a frequent publication, if it featured both the November show by The Grip and the Def Lep show which would have been the following spring!
This is just from memory, but I can check the list for everything I saw there easily enough. Two other things stick out in my mind, Samson being rather poor, and that guy with the winklepicker pixie boots who was the only one who'd ever trouble the dance floor when the band was not on stage. Oh, and watching the video for Crazy Train on that projector screen.
Presumably that wasn't a frequent publication, if it featured both the November show by The Grip and the Def Lep show which would have been the following spring!
Ah-ha; maybe we don't have that Grip gig in common after all!
I moved to Poole in January '88 (just in time to catch Deacon Blue at C's) so the Grip gig I was at must've been sometime that spring (around the same time as DL).
We only managed 2 issues of the mag - a couple of months apart - in the spring/early summer of that year. I did pub reviews, gig reviews and photography. Fun times.
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I moved to Poole in January '88 (just in time to catch Deacon Blue at C's) so the Grip gig I was at must've been sometime that spring (around the same time as DL).
We only managed 2 issues of the mag - a couple of months apart - in the spring/early summer of that year. I did pub reviews, gig reviews and photography. Fun times.
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