Artist: Buckcherry, Dear Superstar, heaven's Basement, The Crave

Venue:  02 Academy, Newcastle

Date: 28 July 2009  

In a summer that is more miss than hit, what better way to be ensured of some heat than with four quite outstanding rock bands all in one venue.  

Opening up tonight were Brighton’s The Crave, a band that has a great future ahead of them if this short but impressive opening slot is to go by.

Opening up their account with ‘The Stray’, the band displayed a great professionalism for such a young band and got the crowd going from the off.  The set included the band's excellent single ’High’, a great anthemic number that rocked big style.  The band were so confident they even tried out a new song ‘All Of You’ on the welcoming Geordie masses.  With 'Mercenary Man' to round off the set this band definitely won a few more friends tonight and are a band to watch out for.   

Next up were Heaven’s Basement, a band that took over where The Crave left off rocking the place big style.  Once again due to there being four bands on the bill another short set.

But short set aside the band were into their stride from the opening song ‘Tear Your Heart Out’, a rocking start to the set, but this seemed to also give the sound guy the nod to pump up the bass, so much so that friends of ours in the middle of the venue said the vocals were almost incoherent, which spoiled the set for them.

As we were at the side of the venue this didn’t seem as apparent, but we’d heard some more complaints after the show about the bass overwhelming the sound.  Such a shame because the band sounded great from what we could hear.  

The band continued their set unknowing of the sound out front, with ‘Misunderstood’, ‘Reign On My Parade’ and ‘If I Could Change', before rounding it off with ‘Executioners Day’.  The band will soon be playing to this size crowd before too long but hopefully the sound guy will get used to bigger venues. 

Dear Superstar have come a long way in a short time with supports slots for Papa Roach and being invited along to Cruefest by Tommy Lee being just a couple of the highlights talked about by Micky and Stew during our pre-show interview with the band.

The band took the bull by the horns from the beginning of the set opening up with ‘Brink of Destruction’ as Micky dominated the stage bouncing around like a whirling dervish to this kick-ass opener.

The ball busting rock continued with ‘Diseased & Distraught’, before the band paid homage to their eighties heroes with ‘Never Surrender’, the band were definitely pumped up for action tonight, giving it 110% as always.

The band seemed more confident than ever before, as they threw caution to the wind with a new song ‘Her Greed My Vanity’, before getting back to the more familiar songs ‘Signpost’s To Bedposts’ and the excellent ‘Glitter Like Gold’.  

The set was rounded off in great style with ‘Raised Voices & Confrontations’ and what else but the superb ‘Brothers In Blood’.  The band like Heaven’s Basement are destined for great things so don’t be surprised if both band make their marks in 2010. 

Now on to one of the best party rock bands to come out of the US in years, Buckcherry.

Led by Josh Todd the band have sent waves around the world with their self titled debut album in 1999 and with the follow up 'Time Bomb' and subsequent albums since then.  The band had a short hiatus but returned with their ‘15’ opus and more recently ‘Black Butterfly’, although it was the classic Buckcherry that most had come to see tonight.  As the lights went down the party just went into overdrive.

With the Mission Impossible theme leading the way for Todd and the rest of the band to burst into action with ‘Tired Of You’ from the latest album ‘Black Butterfly’, this propelled the rest of us into action as the crowd just erupted into a frenzy of sweat and cheers.

The ass kicking rock continued with ‘Next 2 You’ and ‘Broken Glass’, both sending the massed crowd into a frenzy once again.  It was only at this time did Todd offer a few words, before the band continued with ‘Sacrifice’ and the fantastic ‘Lit Up’.  By this time the place was just jumping, the crowd were fuelled by the band and the band were fuelled by the crowd, as it should be with both parties firing off each other.

With guitarist Yogi throwing out guitar pick like confetti the party atmosphere continued with a couple more off 'Black Butterfly', ‘Talk To Me’ and ‘Rescue Me’ before returning to the debut album for a real touch of rock class with ‘Check Your Head’.  

As rock band go they don’t get any better live than Buckcherry and Todd is the perfect frontman for this type of sleaze driven hard rock, with his tattooed body and skinny body.

The back kept the tempo going with a couple more crowd favourites ‘Ridin’ and Dirty Mind’, before giving us the band tremendous cover of the Deep Purple classic ‘Highway Star’, which the band did for NASCAR and what a corker of a cover.  Never has the song sounded so sleazy.

The set was rounded off with ‘Everything’ and the love song ‘Sorry’, the band hadn’t left the stage and cries of "Buckcherry! Buckcherry!" hailed out from the now orgasmic Geordie crowd.  It wasn’t long before the band were back to put the icing on what had been a great gig with ‘Crazy Bitch’, which everyone and I mean everyone sang a long to.  The night was ended with ‘Onset’ where again the Geordie choir was in fine voice.

I’ve seen some great gigs this year but this one will remain in my memory for a long time and will be up their with my gigs of the year come December.  

 

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