Tag: Cincinnati
0 Halestorm Rocks The Tristate – Review and Photo Gallery
I don’t think we have talked any where near enough about the band Halestorm at Hard Rock Hideout in 2012, and that has got to change starting now. My first introduction to Halestorm was when, I saw the band play live back in February 2009, when they opened up for Black Stone Cherry and Seether. I was impressed with the band back then, and their live performance has only gotten better since then. I have been wanting to see them live again for a couple of years, and for whatever reason, I kept missing them. In 2012, I have been luck enough to see them three times, including twice this past weekend.
Halestorm closed out their summer U.S. tour with New Medicine and Cavo. Their final two dates were in Cincinnati, Ohio and Lexington, KY. Both shows were well attended, and the Cincinnati show at
Bogart’s was pretty close to being sold out.
New Medicine and Cavo did a solid job opening up both shows, but it was Halestorm that owned the stage. There is a crazy amount of talent in the band, with singer Lzzy Hale, and her brother Arejay on drums, Joe Hottinger on guitar and Josh Smith on bass. Lzzy’s vocals are more powerful now than ever. From her silky smooth vocals to her raging metal like screams, Lzzy Hale is a singer that can simply do it all. She had me mesmerized with the band’s opening number “Love Bites”, and blew me away with their cover of Skid Row’s “Slave To The Grind”. I don’t even thing Sebastian Bach can scream like that anymore.
Arejay Hale has reinvented the drum solo. It has been a long time since I have seen any band do a drum solo. This was such a common thing in the 80’s, and it has seemingly gone by the way side in rock and roll as of late. Mr. Hale is a wildman on the drums. He can hardly be contained by his drum kit. Not only is his drum solo excellent, he also plays bare handed much like former Whitesnake drummer, Tommy Aldridge.
I was blown away by his playing.
Halestorm’s set was exactly the same for the Cincinnati, and Lexington shows, but it didn’t matter. The music both nights was fantastic. It was a great weekend of rock and roll, and I am glad I was able to catch Halestorm, before they left for their UK Headlining Tour. I only wish they could have played longer!
Halestorm’s Set List was: “Love Bites”, “Mz. Hyde”, “It’s Not You”, “Familiar Taste of Poison”, “Rock Show”, “American Boys”, “Don’t Know How To Stop”, “Break In”, “Private Parts”, Arejay’s drum solo, “Slave To the Grind”, “You Call Me Bitch Like It’s A Bad Thing”, “I Miss The Misery”, “I Get Off” and “Here’s To Us”.
Check out our photo gallery from the Cincinnati show below!
0 L.A. Guns at Rhino’s in Cincinnati, Ohio
September was a pretty grueling month at my day job, so I was quite happy to have a rock show to unwind on Friday Night. Tracii Guns brought his version of L.A. Guns to Rhino’s in Cincinnati last Friday. If you haven’t heard, Tracii has reunited with his Shrinking Violet L.A. Guns band mate Jizzy Pearl (Love/Hate, RATT).
I have to admit that I didn’t know what to expect with Jizzy Pearl singing those classic L.A. Guns tunes. I have a copy of Shrinking Violet, and I thought the CD was good, but nothing earth shattering. Tracii Guns always kicks every time I see him live, but Jizzy Pearl singing with him was still new to me in a live setting.
Much to my surprise and liking, this version of L.A. Guns kicks ass! I thought Jizzy Pearl sounded great singing these songs. The band performed most of the L.A. 
Guns classics including in no special order: “Electric Gypsy”, “Bitch is Back”, “Never Enough” “Over the Edge”, “Sex Action”, “The Ballad of Jayne”, “One More Reason”, “No Mercy”, “Rip and Tear”plus two tracks off of Shrinking Violet including “Dreamtime” and “Decide”. I also got a charge out of them doing Love/Hate’s “Black Out in The Red Room”. I never got to see Love/Hate perform it live, so I loved hearing Jizzy & Company do this song. It was also the first time I have seen “Dreamtime” and “Decide” performed live. Both songs were very cool to see performed in a live setting.
The bottom line: Tracii Guns rocked, Jizzy Pearl sang great, Chad Stewart was kicking ass on the drums, and Danny Nordahl was getting it done on the bass.
I am sure the debate will continue on as far as which version of L.A. Guns is the Real or Best L.A. Guns. Both variations of the band rock in my opinion. L.A. Guns with Tracii Guns’ L.A. Guns never sounded better than they do right now!
The band will be on tour throughout the United States until the end of October. Don’t miss them if they hit your town. The remaining dates are listed below.
October 6, 2010     Columbus, Ohio     Slapsy Maxie’s
October 7, 2010    Westland, Michigan    The Token Lounge
October 8, 2010    Baltimore, Maryland    Bourbon Street
October 9, 2010    New York, New York    The Studio at Brewster Hall
October 10, 2010    Albany, New York    Bogie’s
October 11, 2010    Winston-Salem, North Carolina    Platinum Nightlife 
October 13, 2010    Pensacola, Florida    Vinyl Music Hall
October 14, 2010    Jacksonville, Florida    Brewster’s Pit
October 15, 2010    Sarasota, Florida    Pastimes Pub
October 16, 2010    Ft. Lauderdale, Florida Culture Room
October 20, 2010    Dardanelle, Arkansas    Front Street Grill
October 21, 2010    Owensboro, Kentuky    Frankie’s Sports Bar & Games
October 22, 2010    Lee’s Summit, Missouri    Jerry’s Bait Shop
October 23, 2010    Wichita, Kansas    Oz Cafe Concert Venue
October 27, 2010    Orangevale, California    The Broadwalk
October 28, 2010 Â Â Â Santa Clara, California The Avalon
0 New Video – 3 Doors Down – Its Not My Time
The following video from 3 Doors Down, “It’s Not My Time” was filmed in and around Cincinnati, Ohio and Northern KY (home to HRH). I thought that was kind of cool. The song is pretty good too.
Check out the video for, “It’s Not My Time” here.
1 Disturbed Cincinnati Concert Review
Disturbed brought their Indestructible tour to Cincinnati, Ohio’s Bogart’s, Wednesday night.
With three platinum and two number one albums under their belt, Disturbed proves to have quite a large fanbase in the Queen City, as this show was sold out.
Disturbed has brought along two supporting acts on this bill, Art of Dying and Five Finger Death Punch.
Canada’s Art of Dying took the stage at 7:30 P.M. Their set list included the songs, Get Through This, You Don’t Know Me, Completely, and a cool cover of Alice in Chains’, Them Bones. Singer Jonny Hetherington has a pretty good rock voice, and as a whole, the entire band was pretty solid. The large crowd at Bogart’s seemed to like the band pretty well, even though most people were hearing their music for the very first time. Disturbed’s Dan Donegan is a fan of AOD, and asked the band to join this tour. They aren’t as hard as Disturbed, or Five Finger Death Punch, but they did a pretty good job warming up the crowd. Those of you who didn’t get to pick up their CD at this show, can find it at SeeofSound.com.
Five Finger Death Punch took the stage next, and proceeded to turn up the intensity in this elbow to elbow crowd. Five Finger Death Punch has a sound that wavers in and out of thrash metal and hardcore. It is aggressive, high speed, chest thumping music with a killer groove. At first I wondered how Five Finger Death Punch got on this bill. After seeing them live, I realized that they were the perfect band to open up for Disturbed. I was extremely impressed with the musicianship in this band. Zoltan Bathory and Darrell Roberts are one of the better guitar tandems in heavy metal today. They really got the crown going with their short set. No only did singer Ivan Moody electrify the crowd with his performance, but he instigated the first mosh pit of the night. His abrasive vocals take some getting used to, but it seems to work with Five Finger Death Punches’s style of metal.
Some of the tunes played by FFDP were White Knuckles, Death Before Dishonor, The Bleeding, and a cool but heavy cover of the song, Bad Company.
After Five Finger Death Punch’s powerful set, the crowd was supercharged while waiting for Disturbed to take the stage.
Disturbed took the stage about 9:30 P.M. This is the first time that I have seen Disturbed live, so I was not sure what to expect. They immediately took advantage of the electrified crowd, and continued to push us even further. David Draiman proves to be a very charismatic frontman, and is better live than on Disturbed’s studio material. Dan Donegan surprised me with his guitar wizardry. He is one hell of a player. By the time Disturbed broke into their second song, the crowd was in complete mayhem. More crowd surfing, and a second mosh pit broke out, as Disturbed blasted through their groove laden metal.
The Disturbed set included their songs (not in order), Down With the Sickness, Stupify, Stricken, Land of Confusion, Voices, The Game, Deify, as well as their latest hit, a new song off of their new album, Indestructible, called Inside the Fire.
I have been to countless live shows, but I don’t recall any over the last few years where so many people were fired up and enjoying the music, as much as this concert. During Disturbed’s set it was virtually impossible to take any pictures, as there was a massive amount of crowd surfing, fist pumping, and whole bunch of jumping taking place. Disturbed was excellent live, and will be a band I will be seeing again in the future.
Be sure to pick up a copy of their new CD, Indestructible on June 3rd.
The following are the videos taken at the show. Enjoy!
Disturbed – Land of Confusion
Disturbed – Inside the Fire (New single on Indestructible)
3 Saving Abel, Airbourne, Theory of a Deadman Concert Review
HRH favorite Airbourne, Saving Abel and Theory of A Deadman rolled into Cincinnati at Bogart’s on Thursday Night. After seeing Airbourne’s excellent live show in Lexington, KY for the first time, I wasn’t about to miss them when they came back to my area.
Like the meat in a good sandwich, Airbourne took the stage between Saving Abel and Theory of a
Deadman Thursday Night. Much to my surprise, Saving Abel was already done performing and had their packed off the stage before we arrived at 8:00 P.M. We didn’t even realize that they had played, until Theory of a Deadman thanked Saving Abel and Airbourne during the final songs of their set.
I was somewhat disappointed that I didn’t get to see Saving Abel, but I came to see Airbourne, and once they took the stage, any disappointment I may have had for the evening was easily dissipated.
Airbourne took the stage at approximately 8:30. They performed several songs off of their album Running Wild including: Stand Up For Rock ‘N’ Roll, Hellfire, Fat City, Diamond in the Rough, What’s Eating You, Cheap Wine Cheaper Women, Girls in Black, and Running Wild. Airbourne’s set was not quite as energetic as their Headlining show in Lexington, KY had a few short weeks ago. Part of the problem on this night was the audience that came to see the show. Most of the twenty something crowd was there to see Theory of a Deadman, 
and, in my opinion, could care less to see Airbourne. Whatever promoter put these two bands together must have a real sense of humor, as both bands have a completely different style, that are not very complimentary of each other.
In Lexington, KY, Airbourne fed off of the crowd, and the crowd fed off the band. In Cincinnati, the T.O.A.D. crowd was certainly energetic. Their was crowd surfing during Airbourne’s set, but the vibe was no where near the same. This didn’t seem to matter to Airbourne front man Joel O’Keeffe, as he turned in an another amazing live performance. Airbourne started winning the crowd over towards the end of their set, and did receive plenty of applause before they gave up the stage to Theory of A Deadman.
With T.O.A.D., I found myself in a strange position, as I was one of the few in the crowd that did not know the majority of the songs that they performed. Usually, I know a band’s music fairly well before I go to see them, but with Theory of a Deadman, they only came onto my radar with their new CD, Scars & Souvenirs. I like the new CD, fairly well, but I am not familiar with their earlier material. The majority of their set, was their older stuff.
Theory of a Deadman’s singer, Tyler Connolly commands the stage, and has a pretty good voice, that is somewhat like Nickelback’s Chad Kroeger. I don’t think I have seen a hair do like his, since the last time I watched old reruns of Happy Days. The music is by far the most important thing, and their set was pretty tight. They played the tunes Nothing Could Come Between Us, Hate My Life, Santa Monica, Hating Hollywood, Got It Made, Bad Girlfriend, So Happy and two or three other songs, whose names escape me. Even though the sounded great, they were no where near as entertaining as Airbourne, and didn’t have half of the energy. Airbourne is a hard act to follow, and although Theory of a Deadman was good, I thought Airbourne was the better of the two.
I am glad I caught this show, even though it is not the best one that I have seen in 2008.
Enjoy the live clips of Airbourne and Theory of a Deadman below!
Airbourne – Hellfire
Airbourne – Fat City
Airbourne – Runnin’ Wild
Theory of A Deadman – Bad Girlfriend
Theory of A Deadman – So Happy
6 Cinder Road and Tesla – Cincinnati, Ohio Concert Review
Tesla and Cinder Road returned to Cincinnati, Ohio’s Bogarts on Sunday Night.
Cinder Road took the stage shortly after 8 P.M. and put on one great high energy set. The first Cinder Road tune I’m So Sorry(in the video below) was complete
Guitarmageddon! This was a hell of a tune to open the show with, and got the crowd completely pumped up. The band did several of their songs off of their
album Superhuman, as well as a blistering good cover of Billy Idol’s Rebel Yell and Queen’s We Will Rock You. This is the first time I have ever seen Cinder Road live, and I was pretty impressed with their performance.
Tesla took the stage at roughly 9:15 P.M. The sold out
crowd swelled to a point where everyone was shoulder to shoulder. Tesla blazed through Cummin’ Atcha Live, and the crowd was completely fired up. This set the mood for the whole rest of the show. Jeff Keith has been sick for a few weeks now (including tonight), but you would have never known it from the sound of his voice. The band performed several cuts off all of their albums with Mechanical Resonance, and the Real to Reel albums, probably having the most tunes in their set. The band also introduced a brand new, and very cool song, Private Ledbetter (in the video below).
All night long the band was on fire. Frank Hannon and Dave Rude were trading off lead guitar licks and never sounded better. Troy Luccketta and Brian Wheat were excellent and still prove to be one of the better rhythm sections in rock today.
Once again, Tesla has never disappointed me with their live performance. They were great Sunday night! The new song has me excited about the new album they are working on. I am glad to see my favorite band still able to sell out shows in 2008. I can’t wait for Tesla to play live in Cincinnati again. I may have to get my next fix at Rocklahoma 2008!
Cummin’ Atcha Live
Hang Tough
Private Ledbetter (BRAND NEW SONG!!!)
2 A Nervous Wreck and The Bulletboys – Concert Review
A Nervous Wreck opened for The Bulletboys last Thursday night. I have seen this band a few times, in the past. Either my Samuel Adams was distorting my perception, or they were much better than the last time I seen them play live. They had a tight set that included covers of Motley Crue, L.A. Guns, Poison songs and a few of their own original tunes.
The Bulletboys returned to Cincinnati, Ohio’s The Blue Note for the first time in many years. It has been 12 years since I have seen the band perform. Marq Torien is the only original member of the band. I knew this going into the show, so I didn’t expect a whole lot, but I have been a fan of this group for a while, so I came to check out the concert anyway.
The band arrived a little late, as they just drove in from Yonkers, NY, but they were still able to put on a solid show. Marq may be the last original member of the Bulletboys, but he proves to be the most important one.
Torien’s voice hasn’t changed one bit since the band’s debut CD from 1989. The band backing him up was very good, and Torien also proved to have some pretty good skills on the six string as well.
The band played a short but tight set that included, Talk To Your Daughter, THC Groove, Rock Candy, For the Love of Money, Hard as a Rock, Hell on My Heels, Kissin’ Kitty, Hang on St. Christopher and the mandatory Smooth Up In Ya.
Torien mentioned during the show, that they will be on the road later this year with…….The Foo Fighters.
I enjoyed this show, and will certainly catch them again this summer when they go back on tour. I got the chance to talk to Marq and the rest of the band, after the show. They seem pretty excited about their new CD coming out this year, and their up and coming tour this summer.
There are a few dates remaining on this short club tour. Don’t miss them when they head your way!
I hope you enjoy the videos below!
Hard Rock Hideout 