Three great bands and some good old rock and roll 9/10
Pictures and words by Rebecca Willday.
Arriving to Rock city for early doors at 17.30 pm and already the fans are queuing waiting for the doors to open. Waiting patiently in line, I am transported back to October 1999, an 18 year old me waiting to get into Rock City’s small but quaint basement (disco 2) for Buckcherry’s 1st album tour called aptly enough ‘Buckcherry ‘… so fast forward to almost 20 years and I am now stood writing this by the main stage awaiting for the joint headline of the Hoobskank and Buckcherry gig to start.
18.30pm and the Las Vegas based heavy rock band Adelitas Way came on to the stage, to a small but appreciative audience , boy did they have some good tunes! Great catchy chorus and bass lines. They ended their set with the thundering song ‘Invincible’, I’d not heard of the band before the gig, but was left downloading their 2017 album ‘Notorious’ as they left the stage.
Next up at 19.30pm was the tub-thumping Hoobastank and the place was starting to become packed with fans awaiting their show, and wow, what a show they put on! The band opened up with ‘Pieces’. Frontman Doug Robb delivered his vocals with such energy and got the crowd proper worked up. The band played material mostly from their 15 year old album ‘The Reason’ and had the crowd bobbing and singing along to songs like ‘Same Direction’ and ‘Out of Control’, the appreciative crowd loved every song the band delivered, and I can see why – they had great heavy riffs and had a connection with the audience.
Now for the big guns! Its 9pm and curfew is 10pm; 1 hour slot for Buckcherry to deliver some of their greatest material of their 20 year career and also some material from their latest album ‘Warpaint’. Rock city is now nearly at capacity, the band storm on the stage to open with “Head like a Hole”… hang on, am I at the right gig you might ask? But this awesome covers track is from the ‘Warpaint’ album and they delivered an uptown funked up version of the Nine Inch Nails classic, which was well very received by the crowd, along with two other songs from the album – ‘Warpaint’ and ‘Bent’. Lead singer Josh Todd dashed and leapt around the stage like a five year old that’s consumed copious amounts of E numbers, his energy was infectious! The band played as tight as ever, but among their classic hits such as Lit Up, Too Drunk and Sorry, they co-mingled some other covers material such as “I got a feeling” by The Black Eyed Peas into the mix for good measure. The audience loved every moment and of course the band closed with their badass classic of Crazy Bitch which ended the show on a high. The only downside was the limited time the band had on stage, as they could have delivered some more songs from their back catalogue.
A brilliant line up of three great bands, delivering energy and some good old rock and roll.
9 / 10
Adelitas Way Gallery
Hoobastank Gallery
Buckcherry Gallery
