2Handz & Rocket Review

Well, went to a pretty good show last night. Missed a lor of the earlier acts though. As a musician, I by no means as blown away, but all in all the performance was very tight, entertaining and they played all of their hits. I do wish that Jon Pardi would play “Old Hats” live though, but all in all I give it a 6/7 for the show but a 9 for the weather on a June evening in KC with it being an outdoor venue. On a side note, there was a lot of clapping on 1 & 3, which if you know me…drives me nuts! LOL

So Tuesday night, I went to go and see John Waite/Foreigner/Styx the old Riverport. I have to say, every one of these band were true professionals and have not lost anything other than a few original members.

John Waite killed it with his hits while it was still daylight out. Great band to warm us up.

Foreigner sounded absolutely amazing and played their entire catalog of hits. Although I have seen them before open for Kid Rock last year, Kelly Hansen (singer) did his usual pole riser performance during JukeBox Hero and impressed me with his ability to still hit the falsetto notes. The band as a whole was top notch.

Styx crushed it from sound all the way to lights. While vocalist seem to be the first thing to go with bands from this era due to the higher ranges, Tommy Shaw and Lawrence Gowen hit everything just right. Gowen, whom took over for the original member Dennis DeYoung back in 1999 put on an incredible theatrical performance with a revolving keyboard and a vocal range that is second to none. The line up of songs were performed incredibly and true to when they were in their prime. Now the pies de resistance…Todd Sucherman truly proved why he receives the accolades that he does behind the drums from Modern Drummer Magazing and just about every other publication . Such an amazing backbone to every song.

All in all…I have to give this show a 9 out of 10. Only leaving the 1 of off for the sake of my credibility because I am already a huge fan of all of the bands.
Big thanks to my buddy Mark for the VIP tix.


Videos in comment section

Went to see Alien Ant Farm down in Dallas at the Lava Cantina. Really cool place and definitely worth a visit. Sound was great as well for this smaller outdoor venue.
The opening band And the Hero Prevails was a solid opening act. A little EMO whiney for my taste, but had a good sound.
AAF came up and just absolutely killed it. They are a stellar group of musicians and have the music to support this statement. Now, as I previously posted, I loose all respect for bands that have harmony vocals in studio and none live, they included all of it. However, and I have to say that I will accept this…the guitar/bass players did do their lower range harmonies, but for the high stuff, there was a guy on stage off to the side that pumped in some effects from the songs as well as hit the higher harmonies. I am good with that as they introduced him and didn’t bury him back stage. Please see some videos below.
All in all, I will give this performance an 8 out of 10…and a side note, I caught a pick, last add .5 for that…..8.5 performance. Merch does have quite a bit to be desired…need to step up the options a little.

Couldn’t agree more with 2Handz on the venue for our road trip to go and see CKY. The openers we also great as well. The sound was good and not over reverberating or anything.
As far as my review on the performance of CKY, from a set list standpoint, they played everything I wanted to hear. Top notch rating there. My one gripe about this performance would be the fact that they are a very heavily harmony vocal band in the studio and although there were multiple mics on stage, there was not one effort by any other band members to sing. I am sorry, but at the professional level of a musician, there is no excuse for that. I am not expecting a rich range or anything at all, but work it out for your vocal abilities and add to the show. I give it a 4 out of 10 for this reason alone.

CKY!!