It was a big crowd at the Hordern, with a head-spinning array of Guns n’ Roses, Slash, Snakepit & Conspirators t-shirts on display throughout the entertainment quarter beforehand.
The Rosie Tatts arrive promptly at 7 pm & launch into ‘One of the Boys’. The tall skinny frame of new recruit Ronnie Simmons on stage right, adding the guitar crunch of offset Mick Arnold’s gnarly slide on the left. Ronnie was last seen at Glamfest 23 as a member of Faster Pussycat, but he looks right at home in his Rose Tattoo cuts.
Angry Anderson, energised by the big crowd, launches into ‘Rock & Roll Outlaw’… and while he speaks some of the lines rather than sings a bit more these days, nobody in the Hordern is really bothered, he’s Angry Anderson for god sake, he can do it however he likes!
“Freedom! Brothers & Sisters, this is your” intro’s ‘We can’t be beaten’, before we get the badass slide/groove/boogie of ‘Bad Boy for Love’. Appropriately, they finish with ‘Nice Boys Don’t Play Rock & Roll’, which detours through ‘Blue Suede Shoes’ on the way to the finish line leaving plenty of satisfied grins on punters young & old.
The Air Raid siren seems to be de rigueur as an intro these days, and so it is bringing The Struts to the Hordern stage as they dive into ‘Prima donna like me’, Singer Luke Spiller is all over the stage, working the crowd from the start. Welcoming “Ladies & Gentlemen, Boys & Girls, and Everything in between”, ‘Body Talks’ jazzy bouncing groove warmed up the crowd at the front, and by the 3rd song ‘Fallin’ with me’, The crowd is starting to sing along. The groovy danceable rhythm of ‘Too Good at Raising Hell’ may have been a touch on the camp side for some of the grizzlier punters around me, but most of the dance floor was getting right into it. With ‘Gone for Good’, the Struts show that when they rock, they can go with the best… Guitarist Adam Slack & bassist Jed Elliott bring the rock to Spiller’s cabaret.
The singer has WAY too much fun with the old left-side vs. right-side sing-off.
The three times I’ve seen the Struts play, each time the Singer has worked his butt off & completely won over the crowd, and tonight was certainly no exception, the Hordern is putty in his hands by the end of the set. ‘Put your money on me’ indeed!
We get “a rousing ‘It could have been me’ to finish, “Welcome to the Struts Family, Baby… Ladies & Gentlemen, remember the name”.
The stage is now bathed in Blue light while Ennio Morricone’s theme from John Carpenter’s ‘The Thing’ sets an atmospheric tone before the stage bursts into life with spotlights & strobes all over as the Conspirators tear into ‘The River is rising’. (The effect is dampened somewhat by the myriad of people who seem to think that you want to watch the show through the screen of their mobile phone, but this is an old gripe from me).
‘Driving Rain’ from the Living the Dream album is next, followed by ‘Halo’ & ‘Too Far Gone’ and the thing that’s striking me even beyond how tight the band are, is the fantastic backing vocal from Bass-player Todd Kerns, his voice working amazingly alongside Myles Kennedy, and to be frank, at times overshadowing him.
The familiar ‘Back from Cali’ gets a big welcome from the crowd, by now its exceedingly obvious to anyone still in doubt, this is far from just “The Slash Show”, this band are a shit-hot unit. Drummer Brent Fitz keeps things thumping along with the groove driving ‘Whatever gets you by’. Sidebar, there seems to be a t-shirt hung up over the amp on Frank Sidoris’ side, I wasn’t close enough to see what it was, but from my spot, it just looked like he was drying his laundry onstage 😉
‘Actions speak louder than words’ with his slinky riff and chugging verse, Slash playing a Gibson Explorer is a weird but refreshing look.
Ladies & Gentlemen Todd “Dammit” Kerns! The Bass-player takes over on lead vocals for a run through ‘Always on the Run’, and does a fabulous job, both singing and revving up the crowd. One thing that’s obvious by the change… Myles Kennedy is a tremendous singer, but as a front man, he’s very Nice… Nice & Polite… and quite low-key. Todd Kerns just added the “Rock star” element to proceedings and set the Hordern alight in the process. Slash, seeming to take the cue goes off the chain on the solo section.
A few songs later the Bass-player is back on vocals, introducing a “New” old tune that they haven’t played before… this turns out to be ‘Bad Apples’ from Illusion I. This is absolutely one of, if not my outright favourite tune from those albums, and this is a killer take, as this is the sole Guns track of the night, the crowd also go suitably nuts.
Myles is back for Starlight from the Slash solo record, which brings the crowd into phone torch-waving mode.
The inevitable solo spot, when it comes is more of a jam with an extended solo by Mr. Hudson, which again highlights how much this is a ‘band rather than a spotlight project. But those who came to see Slash combust on guitar certainly got their wish with the incendiary solo. No mellow atmospherics here, it was all fireworks!
Frank Sidoris is introduced to the crowd before ‘Dr. Alibi’, the Lemmy Song on Slash’s solo record, is appropriately sung again by the Bass player here. ‘Dammit’ sang lead on 3 songs all night, but by the splash he made, it seemed like he’d been there half the night.
‘You’re a Lie’, and an extended outro Jam / Band into session on ‘World on Fire’ bring the main set to a conclusion.
The encore consisted of Anastasia to close, but special mention for the delicately restrained version of Rocket man with Slash on Pedal steel and drummer Brent Fitz on Keys, for me this was where Myles Kennedy shone & really brought it home! This was a fabulous version and the perfect closer.
“Slash featuring Myles Kennedy & the Conspirators, also starring Todd “Dammit” Kerns, Frank Sidoris & Brent Fitz”
There! Fixed the billing right there.
Review by Biggs
