This was a gig I went to expecting to hate as I'm not much of a fan of either Sebastian Bach or Skid Row but Jo loves them and this was very much a thank you to her for looking after me while I've been ill.
We got into the Academy in time to see TOSELAND. If they are unfamiliar, it might help if I tell you they are the band fronted by the 2007 world superbike champion (and husband of Katie Melua) James Toseland. They played a set of very tight straight ahead hard rock (or was it Biker metal?), but either way they really rocked and James really knows how to work up a crowd.
Early on he instigated a pretty cool song about wanting to burn down a city which was followed by Singer In A Band. OK, it was a bit cliched but still a good forceful rock tune. Life Is Beautiful, meanwhile, had some good hooks and really worked well. They brought a piano on for Renegade so James could sing while playing and apart from the odd "Elton John!" heckle it went down pretty well.
He closed the short set with Crash Landing which could well be about his time riding superbikes. It had several false endings and some band intros but it also got quite a lot of the crowd singing along to the chorus. I'd like to see him play a full set and Toseland are on tour to promote their 'Renegade' album around the UK until October.
After the break, it was time for SEBASTIAN BACH to bring his Tour Of Hell to us. His 3 piece band came on and opened up with Slave To The Grind and the pretty packed Academy went nuts. It has to be said they sounded great and Sebastian bounded out and started windmilling his hair and running about the stage while singing and really working the crowd.
They then stuck in one of the songs off his latest album, Give Em Hell, and rampaged through Temptation before going back to his Skid Row roots with The Threat. He was now well warmed up and starting to talk a good bit between songs about how great the sound was and it really was sounding good before he launched into Big Guns that also kept all his fans very happy indeed.
Piece Of me was yet another Skid row "classic" that had almost everyone singing along to it and his guitar and bassist really seemed to be nailing it tonight. He then did a skit about Axl Rose turning up by way of introducing Harmony: a song he wrote with Duff McKagan. It was ok, not Duff's best song that's for sure, but it still sounded pretty good.
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He then proved this was going to be a crowd pleasing set with a good go at 18 And Life: another Skid Row song. It was almost like they never threw him out of that band. But it was a huge sing along regardless and had quite a pit going for it too. We then got a long jokey intro for a cover of Pain Museum's American Metalhead that he sang as English Metalhead. Thankfully he seems to have developed a sense of humour over the years and while heartfelt I'm sure he realizes he can be a bit of a parody at times.
Tunnelvision slipped on by and then Seb did a bit of Metal Karaoke with bits of songs by Wrathchild and Judas priest as part of the intro for Taking Back Tomorrow from the new album. It was very entertaining, to be fair. He then dedicated In A Darkened room to Dimebag Darrell as it was apparently his favourite Skid Row song. This saw several fans holding up lighters and I seemed to be the only person in the Academy that didn't know the words.
Monkey Business sounded great and went down a storm which was no surprise as it's a perfect set closer; the sort of song that would guarantee an encore. Sebastian, however, told us he was having so much fun that he wasn't leaving the stage, so instead he walked to the side and then back out and talked when we would have been cheering before the lighters went on again for I Remember You which I guess was as close to a ballad as Skid Row came.
They then stormed through recent single All My Friends Are Dead. A stark title for an ok song, but it's nowhere near as good as Jim Carroll's People Who Died. Then, Sebastian closed the show with Youth Gone Wild which allowed the Academy to go wild. No matter that he's now in his late 40's, it was a storming finish to a great show and just left him to introduce the band and take the applause and say goodnight. Job done in style.
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