M3 Rock Festival – Friday Review

Last Friday night, the M3 Rock Festival started its Friday night KIX off party in style, with not one, not two, but 5 great bands to kick off this awesome annual pilgrimage of classic hard rock. The weather was abysmal, but that did not stop the record crowd from pouring into the Merriweather Post Pavilion

Baltimore’s Bad Seed Rising started off the show, with a tight set of heavy tunes. These young rockers sound great and have a lot of potential. If you haven’t checked them out yet, visit their Facebook page here.

We missed the first few songs from Winger, as we were busy talking to KIX frontman Steve Whiteman (Interview coming to HRH soon). We missed hearing the new Winger tunes from their new album Better Days Comin’, but we did see the band perform most of their classic hits including: “Can’t Get Enough”, “Down Incognito”, “Madalaine” and “Seventeen”. Kip Winger and company sounded great.

Lita Ford was up next, and Lita’s set was not without some surprises of its own. Lita’s former Runaway band mate Cherie Currie joined her on stage for some Runaways classics including “Cherry Bomb”, “American Nights” and “Queens of Noise”. It was a great rock moment, and completely unexpected.

Nothing could have prepared me for what came next. Extreme took the stage at M3 for the first time since the very first M3 in 2009. From the very first note, Extreme was on fire! Gary Cherone was looking great, and sounding even better. Nuno Bettencourt was a lot of fun to watch, as he laid down his incredible guitar licks for those classic Extreme tunes. Extreme pulled off one of the best performances of the weekend, and easily the best of the Friday Night KIX Off party. I can only hope that Extreme will put out some new music, and tour, even if it is on a limited basis. This one off performance was not enough. Hopefully they will get an invite to M3 2015.

Speaking of new music, Hagerstown heros, KIX were the headliners once again at M3 and deservedly so. 2014 was the first time we have heard NEW KIX tunes at M3, and the new songs “Can’t Stop The Show” and “Love Me With The Top Down” were great. KIX has a new album coming out in July, and it can’t get here soon enough. Once again, KIX’s set was outstanding. Steve Whiteman’s vocals were perfect, and Brian Forsythe and Ronnie Younkins guitars were great as well. KIX is the one band that I always look forward to seeing at M3 every year, and they did not disappoint.

The M3 Rock Festival got off to a great start, and as great as Friday night was, Saturday was even better. More on that soon! Check out our photo gallery from the Friday Night, below!