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Events and Reports - Pretty Maids - Live at Train - Aarhus Denmark, December 13th 2006
On a cold and rainy Wednesday night Denmark's Hard Rock pride Pretty Maids chose to start their Christmas Tour. As singer Ronnie Atkins noticed later in the evening "We can easily cope with this Christmas tour, since it only consists of 2 dates - both in Denmark".
Around 3-400 people found their way to the venue "Train". The combination of a Wednesday night and Christmas stress reduced the attendance a bit.
At exactly nine o'clock the explicit from "Carmina Burana" Fortuna started and Pretty Maids went into the usual opener Back to Back. Thereafter Atkins proclaimed that this was their Christmas tour and asked if we all were in the mood to celebrate Christmas where after they played the excellent Hard Rocking Christmas song In Santa's Claws from the same titled EP.
The first song off the new album was the title track. The catchy and in-your-face guitar-drive got lots of heads nodding but in general the tracks from "Wake Up to the Real World" were real show stoppers except for the excellent power ballad Another Shot of Your Love. A song like Such a Rush just goes nowhere and the new songs were all standard. However, Another Shot of Your Love is the one song that renews my faith in Pretty Maids' future existence.
Ronnie Atkins wanted the party started and joked in Danish about the next song's title - Hell on High Heels is a favorite of mine but it lacked the punch that it usually has performed live.
After a slow start Pretty Maids was warmed up and they had aired 4 songs from the new album. As Atkins almost excused to the audience; "we gotta play the new songs to promote the new record because it all about selling records". Fair enuff since they can't live in the past.
Since I am blessed to have seen the band around 10 times it was nice that the band still pulls something up the hat. The band played Savage Heart as it was recorded for the "Stripped" album. Ronnie Atkins sang the first 2 verses splendid only accompanied by piano. The band joined in for the guitar solo and Savage Heart ended in a musical climax.
This was the best I ever heard Ronnie Atkins sing. His voice really benefited from the limited touring and he wasn't cutting any corners on this night.
Another favorite of mine was dusted off namely No Messiah followed by the most recent live favorite from "Planet Panic" Virtual Brutality. The heaviness from that song is perfectly transferred live and the immense groove of Virtual Brutality just works great on stage. Guitarist Ken Hammer's guitar sound on this one is massive since he uses a special guitar, which I think is a detuned 7 string.
Hammer kept the guitar strapped on for a cover of Deep Purple's Perfect Strangers. The song doesn't really work on the new record, but Live it certainly worked musically - but the reception of this classic was a bit slow among the audience and it only seemed like old geezers like myself fully appreciated this rock classic.
The band ended with 3 of the strongest songs from their catalogue Love Games, Please Don't Leave Me and Red Hot and Heavy.
After a massive applaud Pretty Maids returned for the encore Future World. I was nowhere fond of the keyboard sound for this one and this version of Future World was a bit sloppy.
Quickly afterward the place was about to empty since people probably wanted to head home and get ready for work. Atkins jumped on stage and cheered the most enthusiastic people to applaud more and then he promised to bring out the boys for another encore.
The show ended with the brilliant A Merry Jingle and it actually made this concert stand out since Pretty Maids made it special by airing their Christmas tunes. The two Christmas tunes are not cheesy but excellent hard rock songs that deals with the Christmas theme.
The new songs haven't really won the hearts of the audience yet, but Pretty Maids are craftsmen and always put on a solid performance. This was approx. an hour and half in good company with Pretty Maids, which certainly beats sitting home on a cold Wednesday evening watching TV.
Pretty Maids' performance 7
Ronnie Atkins´ vocals 9,5
| Click pictures for a bigger version
All pictures taken by Steen | Written by Michael
Friday, December 22, 2006 |
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