I was there in DC on Sunday close to the stage on Richie's side. Best metal show I've ever seen, even better than Maiden last year and Sabbath in 2016.
The setlist was rad except for Turbo lover, never liked that song. They could've played 1 more song off Firepower album like Never the Heroes or No Surrender instead.
I agree about the no chemistry thing between Richie and Andy, but they played great.
I’m not keen on the production of this, and the last few Priest albums, guitars sound too processed to me, and doesn’t seem to be a lot of bass going on. Very cold and clinical sounding. The songs on the first couple of listens do sound like an improvement on their previous re-union albums.
That's Sneap for you. Play this and any of the new Accept albums and they are basically the exact same template. It sounds good, but entirely devoid of character and uniqueness.
I always found Halford's behaviour on stage weird, particularly when he came back to the spotlight with his solo band. When he was younger he was much more agile, talkative and would look at the crowd. When he came back, he always performed hunched forward with sunglasses and rarely spoke, and when he did it was cliche metal phrases. I think he's got some physical problems (probably back pain) so he just focuses on singing.
That's Sneap for you. Play this and any of the new Accept albums and they are basically the exact same template. It sounds good, but entirely devoid of character and uniqueness.
I always found Halford's behaviour on stage weird, particularly when he came back to the spotlight with his solo band. When he was younger he was much more agile, talkative and would look at the crowd. When he came back, he always performed hunched forward with sunglasses and rarely spoke, and when he did it was cliche metal phrases. I think he's got some physical problems (probably back pain) so he just focuses on singing.
Yeah, he just wanders about being vacant/enigmatic. I'd been warned his singing was crap, but it wasn't, so you could be right, he's concentrating on vocal performance.
Tipton's twiddling of knobs is absent this time and it's evident. He co-produced Redeemer and Nostradamus(with KK) and obviously had a hand in others, all of which feel alive if not always comfortable, but I prefer that. I seem to be in the minority by thinking Firepower has a dull soundscape. And it's a struggle to watch/listen to them live on ytube.
That said I just can’t commit to seeing them again without either Glenn OR KK on board, it’s just too weird.
My feeling is, had they only played select dates and no further world tours as originally planned, after 2011, Glenn could possibly still have carried on.
I bet KK is fuming at Priest’s success now his golf course is up in smoke.
I still am surprised at the bands anti Ken stance after 40 years service. Rob left but it was soon all forgiven.
Good to see Glenn was at the NY signing yesterday.
I always found Halford's behaviour on stage weird, particularly when he came back to the spotlight with his solo band. When he was younger he was much more agile, talkative and would look at the crowd. When he came back, he always performed hunched forward with sunglasses and rarely spoke, and when he did it was cliche metal phrases. I think he's got some physical problems (probably back pain) so he just focuses on singing.
Based on various comments I've seen, I think the hunched over the monitor stance he often uses is actually him reading the lyrics off an autocue screen on the monitor itself.
This is an observation by the way, I'm not trying to insult Rob.
Well Rob has been like this since the reunion, yes a far cry from the frontman he was in the 80s, barely looking at the crowd, and staring at the monitor, but the pipes are still remarkable.
I’m guessing when KK mentioned about being “unhappy with the live performance” he was referring to Rob.
Last year, in an interview with Rock Candy Magazine, K.K. Downing mentioned that Glenn and him had started to disagree on many things around the time when Demolition was recorded.
It transpired that he had not been happy for quite some time. That being said, jumping ship after a farewell tour had been announced, seemed like a rather extreme way of showing your disagreement with the other band members.
I wonder if K.K. will cover the 1982 North American dates when Maiden were supporting them. Tension was high and, apparently, jealousy about merch sales nearly meant that Maiden were kicked out of the tour!
Black Star Riders were fine. Anytime someone covers their previous band's stuff in the first two songs of a set, I am very cautious about their music. It was fine, but not really my type of music.
I thoroughly enjoyed Saxon. They played several tracks off their new album, Thunderbolt, which I think is actually a pretty good album. Biff Byford wasn't terribly energetic but he did a decent job as a frontman for my first time seeing them, and the band seemed to have a good time. They played 11 songs and it felt like it was just the right amount of time.
Priest came out and the first thing I noticed was how cheap their stage set looked. Everything looked like it was made of cardboard and it was very flimsy in appearance. It was a stage layout that makes the standard Iron Maiden layout look very exciting. This is probably for the best because the band doesn't roam too much. Ian Hill stays in the same corner he's always stayed in and Andy Sneap occupied the area in front of him. By far the most active member was Richie Faulkner, who really impressed me with both his leads and charisma. The guy is electric to watch! Whatever he does after Priest, I'll check it out. Rob was pretty good. His voice blew out after
The Ripper
but up until then it was actually in really good shape. He definitely reads off a prompter most of the time, especially for the newer songs, but he had some pretty decent stage presence for a 66 year old guy. Rob talked to the crowd several times, but he didn't really seem to know where he was, it was very generic. We got more from Scott when he introduced
Painkiller
.
Rest of the review in spoilers:
All three songs off Firepower went down really well live, I thoroughly enjoyed them and thought especially Evil Never Dies was great live. Saints in Hell was only okay, and it is weird to hear Turbo Lover without synths. Crowd was into Turbo Lover a lot though, so I guess it was a good choice. The Green Manalishi was great and well, Painkiller was awesome even if Rob's voice was almost gone for it. Overall a really great experience and I did enjoy it a lot. A few people mentioned that Andy wasn't really doing much live. This remains true in that he's not as great an on stage actor as Richie, but I thought he was present most of the show, and he moved around and did some rock stuff. He took the leads on about a quarter of the songs, including Metal Gods and You've Got Another Thing Comin'. I didn't feel like he did bad at all.
That's Sneap for you. Play this and any of the new Accept albums and they are basically the exact same template. It sounds good, but entirely devoid of character and uniqueness.
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