On a Wednesday night at the Hordon Pavilion in Sydney we were treated to two famous acts all the way from the USA.
First up was John 5 who recently toured as Motley Crue’s guitarist for their recent stadium tour. Let the hoedown begin. It was a cross between Doc Watson (a bluegrass great) and Eddie Van Halen. There were no vocals, just guitar and drums with occasional backing tracks.
John obviously knows his music history with a great version of How High the Moon which was a hit for the great guitarist Les Paul back in the 50s. He did an instrumental version of the Queen classic Crazy Thing Called Love with the crown filling in the vocals in an enthusiastic singalong. That was a nice inclusion by John.
He finished his set with a couple of songs from his “other” band (Motley Crue), which the crowd appreciated and was joined on stage by his guitar tech playing bass. All in all his performance was inspiring.
Next up was Steel Panther. Strangely their intro tape sounded like a home recording?
Definitely inspired by Motley Crüe, Van Harlan, The Sweet and Joe Satrani they proceeded to entertain the audience with their tongue in cheek rock show. The show had elements of Las Vegas shows about it and when came time to introduce the band members it was possibly the longest intro in history.
Interestingly their stage set up is the same as Van Halen, The Sweet, The Who, Led Zeppelin with guitar to the right and bass on the left side.
The obligatory guitar solo was very reminiscent of Ace Frehley from the 70s & 80s with a touch of Satrani and Van Halen. He goes by the name of Satchel which appears to be a play on Joe Satrani nickname of Satch.
There was the Rick Allen impression, the Asian hooker, Anna’s titties segment, the Extreme song rip off power Ballard, Fuck all night, party all day reference to the Kiss song. The complete rock show.
The audience left happy.
