This was the first night of RECKLESS LOVE'S 4-week residency at the Barfly during the final leg of the now over a year long Animal Attraction tour. This leg is basically a month-long UK tour throughout October and a few other dates before the band go back into the studio to record their 3rd album.
Tonight sold out well in advance and we got in just after VOODOO SIX had come on. Now try to not get confused with all the other bands with Voodoo in their name as I managed to get it into my head we were seeing Voodoo Johnson again who we saw opening for Europe, but no it's definitely Voodoo Six who we saw at Sonisphere I believe. Either way at this gig they were mainly playing new material off of their next CD. That much I know for sure.
They play pretty much classic English rock in the mould of Gillan meets Led Zeppelin and brings his Biker mates along to add a little Orange Goblin to the mix with some good forceful vocals that are upfront and don't let us miss the meaning the singer is ramming home on songs like Don't Lead Me on. They are damn tight and just polished enough to get the place going and to make sure that when they sing When The Ship Goes Down it doesn't in any way refer to the band's own performance.
The riffs kept on coming for the entire set and if this is the new material then the album should sound as classic Rock as you could want it to. They were a very good opening band. During the break, Spinefarm Records' boss came over to say hello to Jo and give us wristbands for the aftershow. Good man.
After the break, Ollie Hermann's current band came on and opened with Animal Attraction: not only the song and album title but also of course the tour title and it's a rampaging glam tune that Pepe the "Guitar God" did everything he could to make it sound like a Van Halen mid 80s classic. That went quickly into Speedin' in the same way that it does on the CD and they had the up for it crowd going for it big-style.
Ollie then welcomed us and promised anyone who was going to all four London shows that they will all be different before continuing the set the normal way with Bad Ass Baby. It had a good little guitar solo in it. Ollie did his best to make all the women present squirm with delight on Born To Break Your Heart and he probably succeeded as they were all convinced Beautiful Bomb was about them.
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As long as that's how they felt then they would all Dance for this band and after so long on tour they are very tight with just enough playing around at the start or end of the songs to keep themselves interested. Hoping they were indeed about to be taken Back To Paradise once more, it certainly got the crowd moving a fair bit. Ollie then announced that the next song would be the band's first ever performance of a tune off of the new EP that is out halfway through this tour but still isn't listed on the band's website. I think it's called Push and is a love song about wanting to push your body closer to someone else's. So now you know.
They then got most of the crowd to sing along during On The Radio which is their biggest hit so far. They then went back to the first album for Wild Touch to close the set. They left the stage to a smattering of applause and then sort of silence as everyone waited for the encore but didn't really cheer for it. Anyway they came back and, as promised, played a couple of covers, the first of which also featured special guest guitar and vocals by Will and Jon from Jettblack as they tore through Whitesnake's Bad Boys. The addition of the second guitar really added a lot more weight to the band's sound and was by far the heaviest they sounded all night.
They then led us in a mass sing along to the old Judas Priest classic Living After Midnight that continued on the band's cheesiest tune of all, Hot Hot Hotter Than Hell before they wrapped the show up with One More Time and finally the crowd cheered them properly as they left promising to be back next week.
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