Never judge a book by it's cover!

Seeing a lineup such as the Kerrang! Tour of 2013 is hard to resist applying for and shooting a bunch of bands that I usually wouldn't listen to. The sort of music Kerrang has slowly evolved into is more into the new age rock of the 21st century which mainly consists (of what I would call) 'screamo' music. I still stand by my guns with that and won't suddenly begin to like it but after witnessing the Kerrang! Tour I can say that the main headliners The Black Vaile Brides were a great bunch of performers and entertainers! To say the least....

First up was Fearless Vampire Killers who I was late to shoot as I was trying to sort out a photo pass that had been misplaced... however I managed to quickly snap a few photos in the last 10 seconds of the 3rd song haha. I was then quickly ushered out of the pit and into the sweaty crowd of teenagers. The following band Tonight Alive were a band from 'down under' and I must say I really enjoyed shooting these guys, they were great with the crowd and the toggers; pointing and gesturing to the crowd all sorts of actions to engage them with their music.

Chiodos was the penultimate band to perform and this is sort of band that would usually make me cringe as all I hear really is a deeper voiced Jaba the Hut but with a really bad cough... not my sort of thing but again I can't judge a book by it's cover as they were actually really good. They entertained the crowd and had such a high level of energy on stage.

 

The main act of the night, Black Veil Brides, hit of their set with a bit of a bumpy start as lead singer Andy Biersack injured himself on entering the stage causing the first song to be put on hold while paramedics tended to the frontman. Not what they had in mind! The guys were great fun to shoot, giving the toggers in the pit everything they wanted, the poses, the outrageous moves and the exaggerated playing styles. Grabbing as many action shots as I could the time in the pit went quicker than any other gig I have shot and would love to have the chance to shoot them again. Again not really my sort of music but they were great!

 

 

Hopefully more gigs will be coming my way this year including Journey, Whitesnake, Lawson, McFly and maybe a Kasabian charity gig at Doncaster sports hall!

  

Slash, Download 2012

After being with the hugely successful rock band Guns n’ Roses, song writer and guitarist Slash appeared with his new band at the 2012 Download festival headlining the Zippo encore stage on the Friday night. He and Axl Rose both worked together throughout the 80’s and 90’s in Guns n’ Roses and collectively released hugely successful songs and albums the most well known and received album being the 1987 album titled “Appetite For Destruction” which featured hits such as ‘Night Train’ ‘Welcome to the Jungle’ and ‘Paradise City’ all which have peaked in the top 100 and even got to number 1. After the band split up, and left front man Axl Rose on his own, he formed the ‘new’ Guns n’ Roses and Slash teamed up with various artists to bring out his first self tiled album “Slash” which was released in 2010 and which features artists such as Fergie, Lemmy and Iggy Pop. After this album went down well with critics and the fans slash joined up with Alter Bridge’s lead man Myles Kennedy to record a second album, just released a few months back. Slash and Myles started their musical relationship while recording the song ‘Starlight’ which was featured on the “Slash” album, said Myles at Download festival and they have taken it from there.

After having bands on the Zippo stage all day the crowd were getting restless and wanted to see what they had stood all day for... and in the rain! Bands that also featured on the Zippo stage were The Quire Boys, the reunited Little Angels, Nightwish and, if they had turned up on time Europe, but a delayed flight into Donington meant that their set got cut from the whole festival. The crowd had expectations from Slash and he certainly delivered to them playing all of his greatest hits and even putting in some new material from his latest album, as he should. He opened with ‘One Last Thrill’ and then proceeding onto the Guns n’ Roses song ‘Night Train’ to wish Myles had put his own mark on the vocals and which left Axl’s version in the dust! There was no comparison, Myles was just an overall better man for the job he even comes with the added bonus of actually turning up on time and sober! His voice has an edge to it that makes him perfect to sing the new material he has wrote with slash to singing some early Guns n’ Roses stuff that he didn’t sing on. 

I had never seen Slash live before but listen to him constantly on both my music player and his live stuff that shown on TV and I was really excited about hearing these flaming solos I have only ever heard but never witnessed. I have to hand it to him; he knows how to work that guitar! Every note he played had electric running through it and even while dancing around on stage like a headless chicken, still managed to pull off some amazing stuff on his famous Les Paul axe. All the other band members turned their instruments down when he was soloing which was good as we heard them clearly (which is what we were there for, after the entire act is called Slash). You could say that’s harder for him as with his guitar being the centre of attention he has NO room for error and there wasn’t any. All the solos were just how they sounded on the studio albums if not better as they had that input of some improve on Slashes part. 

After about an hour of pleasing the crowd with some fast hits and wild solos the band on stage slowed the pace down a bit and played the song that brought Myles and Slash together ‘Starlight’ to which lighters were brought out and hands were swung in the air. It was a magical moment to watch and even more to see the Download crowd sing their hearts out and to watch Slash play some soft riffs, a well needed break for the band... and the crowd for that matter!! After that they soared through more hits of both Slash’s and Guns n’ Roses including ‘Mr Brownstone’ and ‘Sweet Child O’ Mine’ before ending on a killer ‘Paradise City’. I never thought I would get to hear this played by Slash as I didn’t know that he still played this, and from the crowd’s reaction neither did they! The crowd were once again warmed up to go crazy and Myles had them under his control telling them to sing and they did. If you ever get to hear 20,000 people singing at the same time it is a wonderful moment. The final solo that Slash pulled off was crazy, I'm surprised that the band could keep up. He was on FIRE! He ripped through the solo going crazy all over the stage before finally thanking Donington for being there to support him and his band and finally walked off.

Every band that day played amazingly and pleased the crowd, the only downside was not to see Europe play put instead having to hear the fans in the crowd sing ‘The Final Countdown’ which I have to admit was pretty funny. Till next year Donington... 

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A quick snippet of what's to come

So just a quick update to say I have a couple of VIP tickets for download festival this year! So me and my friend will be going and I will be reviewing as many bands as I can see as well as some artists if I get a chance to! This year at download see's the great Prodigy headline for the first time as well as comeback from Metallica who has played both download festival and monsters of rock festival before. The one that everyone will be coming for is the reunion of the mighty Black Sabbath, and to make it even more special it is their only gig in europe this year!! One not to be missed!
As well as download I also have a VIP pass to V-Fest this year which has Noel and his brids play as well as The Stone Roses and The Killers, again I will be trying to get a hold of these artists for a quick interview as well as snapping up some great photos for you all. Till then...