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Events and Reports - Sweden Rock Festival 2008 - Day 3 (Stuart) - Accepted, Ace Frehley, Saxon
Day 1
Day 2
Day 3
Day 4
Friday started off with us checking out Royal Hunt who I'd never heard before. Their progressive stylings are not really my scene but they put in a good shift with ex Malmsteen singer Mark Boals sounding on top form.
The Hobbit and I then decided to forgo seeing Tesla in favour of going to watch an Accept tribute band cleverly called Accepted. Accept/U.D.O are among my all time favourite live acts so the tribute band had a lot to live up to. Thankfully they were pretty damn faithful to the real thing, in fact if you closed your eyes it could have been the real thing on stage (apart from the occasional scream that only Udo can really do justice to in his own style)
They managed to pull a pretty big not to mention vocal crowd and played all the Accept hits including "Restless And Wild", "Son Of A Bitch" and "Princess Of The Dawn". After playing a rip-roaring version of "Balls To The Wall" the band left the stage and a roadie made his way over to switch off the amps. The band proved to be rebels after all and jumped back on stage to speed through a rocking rendition of "Burning". This took them way over their allotted stage time, much to the organiser's obvious displeasure. Well done lads, you did us proud!
I then ran into Duffy and Steve and we decided to watch a bit of Axewitch. They had been billed as one of the original wave of Swedish Thrash but there didn't seem to be much Thrash on display, only bog standard Heavy Metal. The highlight of an uninspiring set was a cover of "Anti-Social" by Anthrax.
After a beer at the campsite we went to check out Shakin Street who had Manowar's Ross The Boss in their ranks. It was an unfortunate time slot for them as they clashed with not only Team Cans (a choir lead by Hammerfall's Joacim Cans) performing the Swedish National anthem but also original KISS member Ace Frehley's solo set.
This clash saw them come on stage to a crowd of around 50 or so souls. And to be honest they were pretty naff, imagine if you will 70's French rock 'n' roll tinged with a slight metal edge and hemmed by a diminutive front woman with a very unique (and by that I mean high pitched and rather poor) voice. Sounds great doesn't it?
To be fair to them the couple of songs that I did stick around for were dull but really came to life in the solo sections as Ross showed us that he can still put together a mean melodic lead given half the chance. I didn't hang about for long though as in the words of the man himself "Ace is back and he told you so!"
Despite being a massive Kiss fan I had never looked into Ace's solo material before now so I wasn't really sure what to expect. As it turns out most of it seems pretty damn good and Ace still knows how to put on a good Rock 'n' Roll show without Gene and Paul by his side.
The first few songs seemed like fairly standard Hard Rock numbers, however as soon as Ace and the gang launched into "Rock Soldiers" things started to pick up and when the opening notes of the KISS classic "Shout It Out Loud" blasted out of the PA he had the crowd in the palm of his hand. Interestingly the band shared vocal duties on a few of the songs with the drummer showing that he was in possession of a stronger voice than Ace. The cover of the Rolling Stones "2000 Man" went down a treat as did "New York Groove" (renamed Sweden Groove in honour of the occasion). The main set was ended by "Shock Me", a guitar solo that was so damn hot Ace had to be hosed down by a fire extinguisher and the title track from his forthcoming album "Rocket Ride".
If it had been good so far then Ace was taking no prisoners with an encore consisting of "Deuce", "Love Gun" and "Cold Gin". "Love Gun" in particular sounded excellent and it was great to see the front rows air drumming along to the pre-chorus fills.
After Ace's set I had to choose between going to see some crushing Death Metal in the shape of Carcass or join the glam kids and party with Hanoi Rocks. It was one of the only clashes of the festival and I had been debating it all weekend. In the end I trudged over to the Sweden stage for Carcass and met up with Craig who left Ace a little earlier than I did.
By this time the extreme heat was really starting to take its toll on me and the sound guys for Carcass were doing me no favours. Standing a few people away from the barrier the music was indistinguishable over the pounding blastbeats of Daniel Erlandsson's kit. I lasted three songs before getting pissed off with the atrocious sound quality and decided to try my luck further back.
I stood towards the back and was dismayed to find out the sound was just as poor. In the end I gave up and decided to have a rest on the grass, where I promptly fell asleep. I awoke what must have been 15-20 minutes later with a couple of worried guys standing over me. One of them said something to me and I uttered the immortal phrase "Sorry do you speak English?" to which came a reply that will stay with me for some time:
"Ahhh If the light takes you, beware of the light! Do you have any sunscreen on?"
This is not the sort of questioning one expects to be wakened by at a festival and I sat there in a daze for a few seconds before thanking them for there concern and stumbling off in search of food.
I got myself a hot dog and decided I was recovered enough to take on Hanoi Rocks. I'm glad those guys woke me up when they did as I got to the Rock stage just in time to see the band play "Don't Never Leave Me" and "Tragedy" from their first album back to back. The rest of their show was highly enjoyable, especially seeing Michael Monroe leap about the stage and swing is mic stand like a man possessed.
We all met up again after Hanoi Rocks and decided to give Whitesnake a wide berth as none of us could be bothered with David Coverdale's brand of cock rock. We killed some time back at the campsite before heading off to see English Heavy Metal veterans Saxon.
Having never seen Saxon before it turned out I was in for a treat. Biff Byford is one hell of a front man, managing to whip the crowd into frenzy within seconds of appearing on stage plus his banter was second to none all night. The rest of the band sounded great too, Paul Quin and Doug Scarratt's guitar work was a joy to hear backed up by Nibs Carter and Nigel Glocker tight rhythm section. I had previously though that Saxon were a bit too workman-like in the way they constructed songs to get excited about, but it turned out I was quite wrong.
Old songs like "747 (Strangers In The Night)" and newer ones such as "Witchfinder General" sent the crowd into orbit as the band coxed the loudest response of the festival out of them. Biff himself couldn't even stop them as they sang the "Woh oh" section normally reserved for "Wheels of Steel" in the proceeding song "I Got To Rock (To Stay Alive)" as well as in "Wheels" itself! The Eagle lighting rig made a welcome appearance towards the end of the set to add an even greater sense of spectacle to the occasion.
| Click pictures for a bigger version.
Ace Frehley
Ace Frehley
Ace Frehley
Ace Frehley
Ace Frehley
Saxon
Saxon
Saxon
Saxon
Saxon
Saxon
All pictures taken by Steen | Written by Stuart
Sunday, July 20, 2008 |
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