Concert Reviews

  Promoted as a Thrash Metal night with a Slayer and a Megadeth tribute, it became clear quickly that the Slayer tribute band wasn’t there. Luckily ‘Exit Out’ stepped in – a very down to earth four piece with an awesome (blind) drummer (always amazing to see when people labelled as ‘disabled’ follow their passions and succeed) and a guitarist that had just joined the band one day before the gig. Exit Out played anything but metal and soundwise were more grunge (could hear ‘Nirvana’ influences there big time) and a bit of punk than hard rock. But they were really good nonetheless and didn’t have to ‘exit out’ due to musical incompatibility on the thrash metal night. Megadeth UK were freaking awesome – with Dave Mustaine being a giant in the metal community and often hailed as one of the best guitarists ever, it was interesting to witness an effortless performance by Megadeth UK. Of course, all the classics like ‘skin of my teeth’, ‘Hangar 18’ and ‘Symphony of destruction’ were par...

  Gary Numan is arguably one of the most charismatic and one of the weirdest performers simply because he has an awesome voice and writes great tunes but where he starts to sing within any given song seems abrupt and out of sync but let’s just settle for unconventional, which is an awesome thing to be. Gary and the musicians he recorded with in his early career had the band name ‘Tubeway Army’ and eventually it became Gary Numan and Tubeway Army and then just Gary Numan, and while most of the musicians from the Tubeway Army days continued to record and work with him, I personally always felt that the music changed after the abandonment of that distinction ‘Tubeway Army’.  It could be argued that Numan always was the principle songwriter within that unit, when I listen to the first ‘Tubeway Army’ album by the same name and ‘Replicas’ released in 1979 as Gary Numan & Tubeway Army it has a distinct magic in it and an identifiable musical flavour. Over decades Gary Numan has...

  Another smashing night at my favourite venue. Billed as ‘a night of glam rock’, the evening offered exactly what it says on the tin and then some. Both acts were visible excited to play and reconnect to their audiences and both acts also appeared nervous at first which soon gave way to just awesome performances. The Pouk Hill Prophetz kicked ass from the word go and were an amazing support act. Their set included high energy stompers such as Queen’s ‘Tie your mother down’, The Sweets ‘Hellraiser’ and Billy Idol’s ‘White Wedding’ and they all went down a storm. In honour of the recent passing of ZZ Top ’s bass player Dusty Hill they played ‘Tush’ and the Prophetz were very well received. A good start to the evening. What followed was magic:   The only all-female Slade tribute act ‘Slady’ all dressed up in 70s retro cloths brought the house down as they performed the awesome ‘Slade Alive’ album (from 1972) and then some. They were awesome musicians, sincere in their perf...

The world is just coming back to gigs, long may it last. There are many tribute bands and while some are better than others, there are some tribute bands that are absolutely awesome and Atom Heart Floyd is one of those class acts. With a new drummer and the addition of a female vocalist (new as in: since I saw them live back in 2019) somehow their whole gig felt rejuvenated and since there was now a female voice Atom Heart Floyd could play ‘The great gig in the sky’ and it was amazing. I liked them first time around but somehow the chemistry on stage seemed sort of lifted and raised, was lovely to see that. Set list highlights were ‘wish you were here’, another brick in the wall’, the aforementioned ‘great gig in the sky’, ‘shine on you crazy diamond’ and an awesome rendition of ‘comfortably numb’.   ‘Atom’s David Gilmour’ (to say their guitarist doesn’t sound right, sounds diminished somehow) told the audience that the lady on the keys who also controls all the amazing visu...

  What the actual fuck is happening ?? - Venues are having a really tough time with all the Covid 19 restrictions nonsense as they can now sell much less tickets to any of their gigs and have table service throughout and masks have to be worn once away from your table. Iron Maiden tribute act Ed Force One were amazing but having a metal audience seated doesn't really make for a great experience. That being said, Ed Force One (named after Maiden's own tour plane) were absolutely amazing and had Maiden down to perfection. They played two sets and I had to leave after the first set of roughly an hour was over. 'Hallowed be thy name' , 'The Trooper' and 'Fear of the dark' were just some of the Maiden tunes Ed Force one performed and musically they were top notch. I was very impressed by the vocal range of Ed Force One's front man as it is quite a feat to emulate the amazing voice of one Bruce Dickinson. Great night out despite the restrictions that put a...