Chickenfoot - Shepherd's Bush Empire - 25th June 2009

(The above photo is copyright of the legendary Ross Halfin and is reproduced by kind permission. To see other classic photos and read the jammy bugger's diary go to www.rosshalfin.com In case you're wondering 2 of the Rockgig team are just above Michael Anthony's right elbow)

Some gigs are performed to a strict, pre-determined format, some you can tell that the band are just going through the motions (ED: are you listening Skynyrd?) and some rare ones make you feel like you're watching a bunch of good friends have a great time jamming together. Some gigs are low key, some are events and some rare ones are simply awesome.... what we just witnessed was a bunch of highly gifted musician friends jamming and having a laugh. The outcome was awesome and that, my friends, is very rare indeed.

First up - the newly reformed Skin.

I liked Skin when they were around first time - I even forgave them for their cover of EMF's "Unbelievable" because they also did (amongst a cd full others) a cover of "Hangin' on the Telephone" way before Def Leppard decided to do it. Myke "Personal Trainer" Gray's long locks might have gone but the guitar skills were still there and Neville MacDonald's voice was better than ever. (Is it me or is he starting to look and sound like Danny McCafferty of Nazareth?). Considering it was an acoustic set it was really powerful - the old songs worked well in an acoustic framework and really showed off MacDonalds voice. Top notch stuff..the crowd singing along to all the tunes including "Colourblind", "Tower of Strength","House of Love" and my fave "Look but don't Touch". They seemed to enjoy it - we all enjoyed it - I could easily have listened another hour of that.

Next up - Chickenfoot for their only UK date.

If I was choosing my Fantasy Band then 2 out of these would be in the shortlist.

Shepherd Bush Empire is rammed solid and I have never seen so many

snappers in the Press Pit. (check out Ross Halfin's page here) In case you don't know Chickenfoot is; Sammy Hagar (Montrose & Van Halen), Michael Anthony(Van Halen), Chad Smith(Red Hot Chilli Peppers) and guitar God Joe Satriani.

Right from the off with "Avenida Revolution" through most of the excellent album and into "Bad Motor Scooter" and "Highway Star" they had a ball. They were laughing and joking throughout, especially

Chad Smith who was a revelation - a real hard rock drummer.

Michael Anthony's vocals are still as good as ever, as is his bass playing. He was always in Eddie's shadow, but with Joe Satriani seemingly keeping himself reigned in, you could hear how accomplished Anthony is.

Joe Satriani is a legend as far as I am concerned...technical perfection but with feeling too..not flash just for the sake of it and Sammy Hagar's voice is still one of the best in the business.

The songs all seemed to start around a common framework but then they venture off into tangents and then bring it back for the big finish - which on paper sounds boring - but this was anything but boring. It was magnificent. Ian Paice was in the balcony and was spotted filming Highway Star on his phone - presumably to show the rest of his band "That's how it's meant to be done!"

Here's the stats :
Number of times Chad fell off of his drum kit - 1
Number of times they played the best Chickenfoot Song (My Kinda Girl) - 0
Number of times I was nearly killed by a flying drumstick - 4
Number of drumsticks that hit fellow gigger ME on the head - 1
Number of times Sammy was nearly killed by Chad throwing his TomTom drum into the air after the last song - 1
Number of songs that the crowd sang - All of them
Number of times Sammy removed his shades? - 1 when he was hit by a flying TomTom drum.
Number of Happy Punters - 2,000

Number of Chickenfoot band members now in my fantasy band - 4

NR

(Chickenfoot's Facebook page now also has pics from the gig)

Dream Theater- Southampton Guildhall 13th June 2009

A hot sweaty night on the south coast with a sold out 1800 crowd and first up were Frost.A five piece prog act from Reading. Both geetarists sang and so did the keyboard player.Never heard them before and they went down really well once the sound had been sorted out.

Heavy and light prog is my description!!

I love Dream Theater.I thought I would get it out of the way as I don't want to appear to gush to much.

Tonight was a warm up for their Download performance the next day.Only they would play a 2 hour warm up show for a 45 minute festival performance.

Set list was:

• In the presence of enemies part 1.
• Beyond this life.
• Misunderstood.
• A rite of passage.
• Hollow Years.
• Caught in a web.
• Forsaken.
• Erotomania.
• Voices.
• Solitary Shell.
• Constant Motion.
• As I Am.
• Encore of a medley of Metropolis/Learning to live/The Crimson Sunset.

The light show was excellent for such a venue and the sound superb.Every member of the band is a god on their chosen instrument. My 2 favourites are Mike Portnoy on drums and John Petrucci on geetar. I could watch them all nite. Portnoy's ability to play the same beat a different way each time is incredible and Petrucci's solos were just draw dropping.The solo to Hollow Years(a favourite of mine)had the hairs on the back of my neck standing to attention.See it on youtube.com!!

As a long time fan it was great to Caught In A Web again, Forsaken(for the first time missed at Wembley last year) and the ballad Solitary Shell at last was great. During this number a bloke with what only could be described as a Rolley the Poodle from Eastenders moved in front of us.The words lunatic in the song were very apt!!A fantastic extended solo fron Petrucci finished the song.
Only 1 song from the monumental new cd Black Clouds And Silver Linings(out tomorrow) the excellent Rite Of Passage with a great mid song riff and solo from Petrucci. More songs will be played on their return in October at Wembley(tickets in the post)

Who haven't I mentioned?James Labrie on vox put in a great show. I can't understand the stick he is getting on the internet at the mo. John Myung on bass was his usual silent but deep self and Jordan Rudess(keys)had his time at the front during the encore with his sparring solos with Petrucci!!

So after 2 hours it was over.Young and older fans had a great show and their money's worth.

Fab night roll on Wembley in October.

10/10. ME
(ed's note: ME does know that the word "Geetar" is not the correct way to spell it, but frankly he can't be arsed, and I can't be bothered to change it every week)

UFO – Leeds O2 Academy – 16th June 2009

Tonight’s set kicked off with Save Me from the new CD. The sound was excellent, and Phil Mogg was in sparkling form, though I wasn’t too sure about the green camouflage kilt he was wearing.

The bulk of the set came from the Strangers in the Night set list. The songs from the new CD where Save Me and Hell Driver; the rest of the set came the Michael Schenker era, with expectation of When Day Light Comes to Town. There were a couple of surprise tracks, Ain’t No Baby and Cherry both from Obsession.

One of the highlights for me was a great solo and band interaction on Too Hot to Handle, great fun.

As I said earlier Phil Mogg was the real star of the show, his singing was top drawer and his wit between songs was most entertaining.

“The solo in this song is so long I’ve time to go on a short holiday and get a tan, this is Rock Bottom.”

As most of you will know Pete Way is not on this tour, he was replaced by Barry Sparks who put in a good performance, but just didn’t have the showmanship of Pete Way. (Imagine Iron Maiden without Steve Harris.)

A collection of great songs played by a great British band, a 100 minute plus set, I left one happy punter.
And it was less than the parking at Wembley.
NH

Lynyrd Skynyrd - Birmingham NIA - 28th May 2009

Two days later we are back at the NIA and walk in and it is unrecognisable. Nickelback was sold out 8000. Huge floor seats way at the back.Tonite we are at the back 1 block on the floor and then the seats.1500 max with 75% of the venue behind a black curtain.

First on Aynsley Lister. A young british blues geetarist.Never heard of him - he was brilliant.5 cd's into his career.Very Joe Bonamassa as a reference.Great voice and superb geetar backed by a 3 piece band including a young lady on bass!Only played 30 mins well worth looking into the guy.Excellent crowd response.

Now I have seen Skynyrd twice the last time 5 years ago blowing Deep Purple off stage. Since then Hughie Thomasson(geetar), Billy Powell(keys) and Euan Evans(bass) have all passed on. (ever thought you might be a jinx? Ed.)

Basically tonite was a greatest hits - well a 1973-77 set even though they had a backdrop of the new cd Gods and Guns .Nothing got played off of that.

Setlist was Workin for MCA, I aint the one, Saturday Night Special, Gimme back my Bullets, What's your Name, That Smell, Simple Man, a medley of Whisky Rock N'Roller/Down South Jukin/Needle and Spoon/Double Trouble/Tuesday's Gone, Gimme 3 Steps, Call me the Breeze/Sweet Home Alabama and an encore of Freebird.

1 hour 10 mins and then a 10 minute Freebird for £45 and only a 30 min support all over and done by 5 to 10!!!!As you can tell I was disappointed, especially after the bombast and show of Nickelback earlier in the week. It was very tame.Steve hasn't seen them before and enjoyed it.It was all well played all by numbers.Rickey Medlocke is still the star of the show with Michael Cartellone on drums a close second.

One reference to a departed Billy and Euan before Simple Man and a name check for the keys player(Billy Keys).I found out since the new bass player is Rob Kearns and geetarist is Mark Matejka.No reference at all it makes them to be hired hands and nothing else.Gary Rossington looked bored and even Rickey looked a little cheesed off at the crowd response which wasn't great.As they came on for the encore Van Zant said what song do you want to hear and the guy next to me shouted 3 or 4 more would be great.Rickey solod his ass off on Freebird and gone with a promise for more shows on the cd release.

Now I pretty much always give good marks but not this time.

6/10 with 2 taken off for only 80 mins for £45!!!!!

4/10.

ME

Nickelback Birmingham NIA 26th May 2009

First gig for a couple of months and it had to happen our eldest son Daniel's first gig. He was 10 in April and as a Nickelback fan and a little bit of a Black Stone Cherry fan as well, this gig just seemed right for him...and as Shaz loves Nickelback and BSC who am I to say no!!!!!

We could only get standing tickets so although Daniel is nearly 5 foot we got their early to be greeted by a 200 foot queue.We walked around and there were 4 queues all the same length.But once the doors opened we saw the band had a large walkway in the middle, so there was an extra length of front row. We managed to get dead centre of the walkway with only a young girl in front of us.Result!!

First on BSC.Quite a few BSC t shirts around.Less than a year ago we saw them support Def Snake and not a lot of people knew them, this time they did.Starting with Rain Wizard off their first cd they are growing every time you seem them.Then straight into Blind man off the new cd what a 1-2. A great reception from the crowd and great sound too.A few songs off cd 2(including Please Come In and Soul Creek!) then back to cd 1 for Lonely Train.I thought that was it before they played the soon to be huge single Things My Father Said then ended with Maybe Someday and a quick blast of Voodoo Chile!!40 minutes went so fast.Went down really well and so they grow.Go see them in October before the venues get bigger!!

Now Nickelback sold out an 8000 very young crowd!! We saw them in September and I said they were a great live act but Chad waffled on too long.Well this time he waffled but not so much he must read RockGig!!!! (who doesn't? - Ed)

If you go to www.darkhorsetour.com there is a lot of live footage from this tour and chats with roadies about the lights,pyro,etc.Well worth a look.They say they have taken the stage as far as they could go and then some. Well they really have.The stageset was enormous. There were 9 enormous Close Encounters Of The Third Kind type shapes that came down moved etc as part of the lighting rig.Over 500 flame thrower/pyro explosions,an enormous video screen behind the band that also moved for 60 searchlights!! Wow.Is it all show or have they got songs?

Countless hit singles all played superbly.They started with Something In Your Mouth off the new cd and then Because Of You off Long Road. Bang.How was that Daniel?Wow!!They changed it up by dragging Chris Robinson off BSC up to sing and play lead geetar on AC/DC'S Highway To Hell!!Excellent!

Halfway through they moved forward to the walkway and a drumkit came from under the stage and they played new single If Today Was Your Last Day and then onto Rockstar.Daniel loved it as they were no more than 6 foot in front of us!!

For the next single Burn It To The Ground they were filming it mainly the crowd and yes half way through Daniel and me were shown on the large screen!!I could be on MTV yet!!!!Last time we had T shirts propelled into the audience this time they had super charged the guns and could hit the whole arena with them!!That was played to Metallica's Sad But True!!Ending with the bouncy Too Bad.Wow.

A quick romp through Use Somebody by Kings Of Leon with second geetar man Ryan Peake on vox was the first encore.They ended with Animals and enough pyro to start a small war!!

I have to say they blew the Wembley show out of the water with this one.Chad was in great voice and not too much corn this time.Ably assisted by Ryan,Daniel(drums)and Mike on bass they know how to put on the ultimate arena show. I said to Daniel that you don't always see hundreds of lights,explosions and hit singles all the time.As he walked away with his tour t shirt on,carrying a tour poster and an enormous ear to ear grin did he care.Tonite Nickelback ruled!!

ME 10/10.