Sweden Rock Festival 2010 (Day 3) – Wrapped in Blues-Rock with Gary Moore and Cinderella (2010)
Author: Urban Bolta
Photos: Urban Bolta
Location: Sölvesborg / Sweden
Concert date: 10.06.2010
Attendance: 33000
Ticket price: 240€ (4-day ticket)
GRAVE DIGGER (Rock stage)
Grave Digger kicked off the lineup on the Rock stage on day three, old friends of Slovenian stages too. And how could they not be, after thirty years of tirelessly putting out albums and touring the world? They last stopped by here in February of last year, and Rockline caught them again at the end of last summer at Wacken Rocks South (report here). But a lot has changed in the Grave Digger camp since that show. A month later, Manni Schmidt, a hugely popular guitarist among the fans, surprisingly left the band, and Chris Boltendahl found his replacement in an old friend, though a fairly unknown name on the big stage, Axel Ritt.
If Grave Digger shows are by now a more or less familiar constant, Axel Ritt was this time the “excuse” for a trip down to the front of the Sweden Rock stage. By joining the band, Ritt landed in a damn tough spot, because filling Schmidt’s shoes is one hell of a task. The set opened with the standard intro “The Gallows Pole”, the members spread out across the stage and then came “Ballad of a Hangman”, which already answered the main question of the gig and showed how well the newest member clicks with the rhythm section. As usual, the black Grim Reaper on keyboards lurked almost unnoticed at the back left of the stage. I say almost unnoticed because the job of grabbing the crowd’s attention belongs to none other than Chris Boltendahl. The German legends’ vocalist ran the show on well-worn rails, with no major surprises, and, as always with a smile on his face, kept pouring oil on the fire with constant crowd encouragement. Axel Ritt handled the solos and other more demanding parts without the slightest trouble, but his constant glances toward boss Boltendahl gave the impression of doubt in his own abilities. Ritt is bursting with technical skill and, as he proved in one of his spots with some fast-fingered moves, the guy is either very shy or just not used to big stages. I can’t find a third explanation for such an unconfident performance. Grave Digger took the show home on autopilot via their hits “Lionheart”, “Excalibur” and of course “Heavy Metal Breakdown”. Worth mentioning is the song “The Truth” (Tunes of War, 1996), which they hadn’t played live for more than a decade, until that day. Props!
D-A-D (Rock stage)
The Danes of D-A-D pulled a much bigger crowd to the same stage than the Germans before them. Makes sense, since according to the organizer of the Swedish festival, they landed right at the top of the wish list in the annual poll that visitors of the website fill in for the most wanted bands. D-A-D have been on the music scene for almost thirty years, long enough to build a base of loyal fans, who this time cheered the band on very fanatically from the front rows. For a casual listener, which is what I was on the spot, D-A-D can be a very hard meal to digest. Their songs range from catchy melodic choruses and more alternative touches all the way to punk rock blasting, which makes them seriously tough to get into. The fun department is covered by bassist Peter Jensen, who keeps spirits high and gets the laughs with his two-string guitars in inventive shapes (one of them was even shaped like a rocket). The inconsistency of the musical expression and too much stage clowning sent me off toward Dio’s stage before the Danish rockers had even finished.
PRAYING MANTIS (Dio stage)
Once scrappy youngsters, now polished gentlemen – one of the most interesting offerings of the festival, Praying Mantis! When I got to the stage, only a handful of the biggest “fans” were there, so our little crew just lined up along the barrier and formed the front row. Proof of how overlooked Praying Mantis are is the fact that every member prepared everything for the show on their own – playing doesn’t bring in enough money for them to afford a “roadie”. The band has a fresh studio release in their pocket, Sanctuary (review here), from which they conjured up the sweeter “Touch The Rainbow” and “Highway” live. With that latest album, the Mantis introduced their new vocalist Mike Freeland to the public. Mike throws himself into the job on stage one hundred percent, and it seems like he falls into a trance during the show, pulling plenty of faces as he sings with deep feeling, but most importantly, his vocal abilities are more than worthy of the Praying Mantis name. The range and flexibility of his voice fit perfectly with the mix of AOR melodicism and, at times, somewhat harder rhythms. Although many file the Praying Mantis name under the NWOBHM movement, they actually don’t have many direct links to it. Everything that smells of heavy metal gets elegantly wrapped in infectiously melodic riffs, the keyboards nudge them toward AOR waters, and their trademark is the frequent addition of an accompanying acoustic guitar, handled by band co-founder Tino Troy. In an hour-long set, Praying Mantis flew through their studio discography and played live songs from the classic debut “Time Tells No Lies (1981)”, then raced through the nineties all the way to the last album, the already mentioned “Sancturary”. The good-humored musicians coaxed the sun out from behind the clouds for a moment for the first time at the festival, and the excellence of the gig, much like with Quireboys and Treat on the previous two days, was topped off by a crystal-clear sound, with which the festival’s third stage proved itself once again.
RICK SPRINGFIELD (Festival stage)
Right after Praying Mantis finished, I hurried over to the main stage, where Rick Springfield was already almost halfway through his show. The Australian singer was one of the most exclusive names of this year’s edition of the Swedish festival, since his appearances on the Old Continent are a real rarity. Springfield spent the golden years of his music career in the eighties and then vanished from the sight of the wider masses. The show in Sweden was his first encounter with Europe in, believe it or not, a quarter of a century, and so a test of his popularity before the next dates of the mini European tour.
The long absence took its toll. At first there wasn’t much euphoria in front of the stage, and his few fans easily blended in with the casual listeners who made up most of the crowd. But how Rick won them over, and us too, with his show! With charisma and stage presence he easily tamed all the pitfalls of a big festival stage, and his conviction drew more and more people to the front as the gig went on, all marveling at the toughness and good spirits of good old Rick. During “Don’t Talk To Strangers”, Rick invited a little boy up next to him and taught him about the message of the song, and another highlight came with “Human Touch”, when Rick decided to push his way through the crowd all the way to the mixing desk far in the back, from where, up on high, with his band’s musical backing coming from the main stage of course, he sang the entire song. Despite being in his sixties, Springfield seems very youthful, and not just in terms of his looks and energetic performance. Even more importantly, Rick’s voice is holding up against the years really well. Besides the highlights of his career, he also presented his latest studio album “Venus In Overdrive” (2008), but the loudest response understandably went to a former Billboard chart topper, the hit “Jessie’s Girl”. A confident performance and a magical touch of melodic power pop unmistakably conjured up some of the most beautiful moments of Sweden Rock 2010.
MAGNUM (Rock stage)
A little after six in the evening, it was the turn of all the fans of melodic rock, seasoned with AOR melodies on one side and, at times, somewhat more progressive levers in the textures of the songs on the other. Rockline set out to meet Magnum last October, when they were supposed to play in Bologna, Italy, but the Brits canceled at the last minute, out of the blue (probably due to too few tickets sold), so this time was our medium’s first encounter with Magnum. The nice crowd that gathered made it clear that Magnum are very popular in Scandinavia, so singing along to the songs from way back in the crowd was no surprise at all. The Brits devoted their program entirely to newer material, primarily the latest studio album “Into The Valley Of The Moonking” (2009), and “Princess Alice And The Broken Arrow”, released two years before it, was not left out either, so only the final third of their allotted time was reserved for their classic eighties works. A very bold move, considering this wasn’t a headline show of their own, but since both of those latest records are the definition of quality, they pull it off easily. Maybe the reason also lies in Bob Catley’s voice, which no longer reaches the highest registers, so the newer songs, already adapted to his slightly deeper voice, suit him better. All the fans of deeper musical substance got their fill, since Mark Stanway on keyboards and guitar master Tony Clarkin stretched the studio versions a few times with imaginative instrumental parts and took the songs into a new dimension. Between songs Catley & co. addressed the crowd not at all, which gave the show a very impersonal note, but even so, the unique Magnum magic charged up the gathered crowd under the stage with fresh energy before the evening program.
STEEL PANTHER (Sweden stage)
At the same time as Magnum, on the other side of the festival grounds, on the much smaller “Sweden stage”, Steel Panther were entertaining the crowd. It’s a project of seasoned hair metal tomcats who grew up in the eighties on the successes of bands like Bon Jovi, Mötley Crüe and Poison. Steel Panther took the behavior of the most arrogant rock stars of the eighties as the starting point for their image, multiplied it to the power of ten, recorded the album “Feel The Steel” (2009) and carried those “attributes” onto the concert stages, where they now make fun of themselves and their fans. So this is first and foremost a joke project, with no serious musical ambitions in the strict sense of the word. Between songs, vocalist Michael Starr and guitarist Satchel compete with each other over who can pull the better joke out of their sleeve. Among other things, they lured two busty girls onto the stage and asked for their names, but before getting an answer, they mischievously cut off their words to the crowd’s amusement: “Who here even cares about your names?”. The glam rockers definitely got their portion of laughs, while I, after a few minutes of watching, headed back into the arms of Magnum.
CINDERELLA (Festival stage)
What can you say about Cinderella? The European audience is already very hungry for their music, so it’s no surprise that for the last few years they’ve been right at the top of the wish list of festival visitors who submitted their suggestions on the website. The Americans hadn’t been seen on the Old Continent for a whole 18 years, and they came across the pond just for this one festival show. Which means the drought actually continues. Last year Cinderella released the live album “Live At The Mohegan Sun”, which indirectly hinted at a big tour, European dates included. Well, we’re still waiting for the tour, but those of us lucky few who were there grabbed the chance to see Cinderella with both hands in Sweden, of course.
In front of the expected huge crowd, the stage was totally Cinderella’s for the next hour and a half. They split the show into two parts: in the first half they hit the gas and sailed glam metal waters with “Push, Push”, “Somebody Save Me” and “Night Songs”, while for the second part they turned into heartbreakers and played some of their best-known ballads. The big question of the gig was how vocalist Tom Keifer would fare, since his voice has been giving him serious trouble in recent years, so much so that he even went under the knife in 2008. Keifer passed the test brilliantly. True, he approaches the vocal duties extremely carefully, but the voice keeps its recognizable color, unscathed and, when needed, even forceful. Keifer got time to rest his voice thanks to the other band members and of course the audience, to whom he more than once handed over a verse or two, wisely saving a bit of energy. In terms of presence, only guitarist Jeff LaBar can match Keifer, the only one who busted out a “cat walk” and strolled out into the heart of the crowd. The highlights came with “Heartbreak Station”, which LaBar on acoustic guitar and Keifer delivered shoulder to shoulder, the eternal glam anthem “Nobody’s Fool” and the epic ballad “Don’t Know What You Got (Till It’s Gone)”, where Keifer sits down at the piano in crowd-pleasing fashion. Guys, why do you even have Gary Corbett? Corbett is the keyboardist at Cinderella’s shows, but he sits completely unnoticed in the background of the deep stage, and the only time he’d step onto the big stage, following the rule of “let everyone know who’s boss”, Keifer takes over his role. The stroll through Cinderella’s biggest classics thus brought a good dose of glam metal mixed with dreamy blues hard rock, and with a solid performance, the mere fact of how long we’d waited for Cinderella etched their show into my memory forever as an hour and a half of pure pleasure!
BILLY IDOL (Rock stage)
Even before his Ljubljana show, the eternal youngster Billy Idol presented himself to the Swedish audience too. Billy is stopping at a few festivals on this tour, with Sweden Rock being the opener before the next encounters with countless fans in front of the stages of Europe’s biggest festivals.
Sure, in an electric atmosphere a few drops from the sky can sometimes feel good, but when the sky literally opens up and starts pouring so hard that the density of the rain even makes it hard to see the stage, let alone hear the sound coming from it, the weather becomes the main factor of the show. Billy Idol ran into exactly that kind of bad luck. Despite the extremely rough conditions and people running away from the stage looking for shelter, Billy and his star-studded crew squeezed out the most they could at that moment. The show started with the Generation X classic “Ready Steady Go”, and then came the first of the evergreens, “Danicng With Myself”. The charismatic Billy always let the crowd sing a verse or two of the better-known songs, deepening the chemistry between them. On guitar, Billy was joined by none other than Steve Stevens, a man with a hairdo and painted nails of the kind you see today on your average “Bullet For My Valentine”-type schoolkid. But his looks are deceiving – the old-timer is damn good at his job, he nails every note down to the last detail, and even frequent switching between electric and acoustic guitar doesn’t throw him off the rhythm. That very switching between punk rock marches and more melodic, mostly acoustic moments was one of the main remarks about Billy Idol’s show. Billy ran around the stage energetically the whole time and, to the delight of the more delicate part of the crowd, showed off his muscles, so even in his sixth decade Billy isn’t giving up his trademark moves. The song selection satisfied, so did the tightness of the star-studded band and Billy’s voice, but, as already said, the weather spoiled it. Billy Idol and his crew remain a act that’s definitely worth seeing, since they don’t easily let their fans down.
GARY MOORE (Festival stage)
The stroll through the third day of the festival was closed by Gary Moore, one of the greatest blues guitarists of recent decades, but so much more than that. Sure, he earned his name as a musical giant as a blues master, but over his long career Moore also played hard rock and heavy metal, among other things, and it was precisely those two genres that this Moore show was dedicated to. The Swedish crowd is simply used to heavier rhythms, so Moore partly adapted his song selection this time to the specific taste of the “Sweden Rock” audience.
The intro in the form of the song “Dunluce” provided a sleepy bluesy opening, which was jolted awake by the Wild Frontier gem “Over The Hills And Far Away”, a hard rock assault wrapped in Celtic motifs. Now we’re talking! Gary, glued to the spot next to his microphone on the left side of the stage, with tousled hair and a guitar in his hands, presented a cross-section of his career, with an emphasis on his eighties creations. Despite a rather uncharismatic performance, the recognizable motifs of his songs let him hold the crowd in front of the stage right until the end. I stress this because evil tongues had hinted before the gig that he wouldn’t manage it. Truth be told, his name is commercially smaller than Aerosmith or Guns’n’Roses, who headlined the festival the other two days, but Gary Moore also managed to tame the pitfalls of the big stage and clicked wonderfully with the chilled-to-the-bone crowd over an hour and a half together. Despite a somewhat harder selection of songs, the well-known blues sweets “Walking by Myself”, “Still Got The Blues” and, as an extension, “Parisienne Walkways” were not missing. Besides his already familiar guitar virtues, Moore also proved himself a solid vocalist with an excellent overview of what was going on, since he has a refined feel for adjusting the dynamics, or on the other hand the sensuality, of the song being played. The peak of the show came with the already mentioned mega hit “Still Got The Blues”, whose recognizable guitar riff caused an explosion of enthusiasm in front of the stage and was final proof that the organizer’s choice of the charming Gary Moore as the day’s headliner was the right move.
And just like that, the third day of the festival was over way too soon. In the packed schedule there was unfortunately no room to catch a few more of the interesting bands, and my conscience stings the most over skipping Michael Schenker’s set, but catching every interesting act at such a high-quality festival with a pile of stages is simply mission impossible. Looking forward to the last day, we quickly crawled into our sleeping bags. Good night!
Photos: Urban Bolta
Setlist
11:30 — 12:15 THE ITCH (Dio) 12:00 — 13:15 GRAVE DIGGER (Rock) 12:15 — 13:15 BIGELF (Sweden) 13:30 — 14:45 MSG (Festival) 13:45 — 14:45 SCREAMIN’ LORDS (Dio) 15:00 — 16:15 D-A-D (Rock) 15:00 — 16:15 HIGH ON FIRE (Sweden) 15:15 — 16:00 CONNY BLOOM (Rockklassiker) 16:00 — 17:00 PRAYING MANTIS (Dio) 16:30 — 18:00 RICK SPRINGFIELD (Festival) 17:30 — 18:30 CHICKEN SHACK (Dio) 18:15 — 19:45 MAGNUM (Rock) 18:15 — 19:45 STEEL PANTHER (Sweden) 18:30 — 19:30 PUGH ROGEFELDT (Rockklassiker) 20:00 — 21:30 CINDERELLA (Festival) 20:15 — 21:30 SUICIDAL TENDENCIES (Dio) 21:30 — 22:15 BONAFIDE (Rockklassiker) 21:45 — 23:15 BILLY IDOL (Rock) 21:45 — 23:15 MUSTACH (Sweden) 23:30 — 02:00 GARY MOORE (Festival) 24:00 — 01:30 BEHEMOTH (Dio) GRAVE DIGGER setlist: 1. The Gallows Pole 2. Ballad of a Hangman 3. The Roundtable 4. Hell of Disillusion 5. Wedding Day 6. Lionheart 7. The Truth 8. Excalibur 9. Valhalla 10. The Last Supper 11. The Dark of the Sun 12. Knights of the Cross 13. Rebellion (The Clans are Marching) 14. Pray 15. Heavy Metal Breakdown PRAYING MANTIS setlist: 1. Children of the Earth 2. Panic in the Street 3. Cry for the New World 4. Don’t be Affraid of Dark 5. Turn the Tide 6. Touch the Rainbow 6. Rise Up Again 7. Highway 8. Turn the Tables 9. Captured City RICK SPRINGFIELD setlist: 1. Mr. PC 2. I’ve Done Everything for You 3. Affair of the Heart 4. Living in Oz 5. What’s Victoria’s Secret? 6. Celebrate Youth 7. Venus in Overdrive 8. I’ll Miss That Someday 9. Love Is Alright Tonight 10. Crossroad Blues 11. Don’t Talk to Strangers 12. Love Somebody 13. Human Touch 14. Jessie’s Girl ——————- 15. Wild Thing 16. Kristina MAGNUM setlist: 1. Cry To Yourself 2. Take Me To The Edge 3. Brand New Morning 4. The Moonking 5. When We Were Younger 6. No One Knows His Name 7. Dragons Are Real 8. We All Run 9. Les Morts Dansant 10. All My Bridges 11. All England’s Eyes 12. Vigilante ——————– 13. Don’t Wake the Lion (Too Old to Die Young) 14. Kingdom Of Madness STEEL PANTHER setlist: 1. Eyes of a Panther 2. Asian Hooker 3. Fat Girl (Thar She Blows) 4. The Shocker 5. I Want It That Way 6. Guitar Solo 7. Party All Day (Fuck All Night) 8. Community Property 9. Turn out the Lights 10. Girl from Oklahoma 11. Eatin’ Ain’t Cheatin’ 12. Hell’s on Fire ——————– 13. Death to all but Metal 14. Party All Day (Fuck All Night) 15. Kickstart My Heart CINDERELLA setlist: 1. Second Wind 2. Push Push 3. Somebody Save Me 4. The Last Mile 5. Night Songs 6. Bad Seamstress Blues/Falling Apart At The Seams 7. Heartbreak Station 8. Coming Home 9. Shelter Me 10. Nobody’s Fool 11. Gypsy Road ——————— 12. Don’t Know What You Got (Till It’s Gone) 13. Shake Me BILLY IDOL setlist: 1. Ready Steady Go 2. Dancing With Myself 3. Love Is Strange 4. Scream 5. White Wedding, Part 1 6. Cool Operator 7. Prodigal Blues 8. Bitter Pill 9. Twenty Flight Rock 10. To Be a Lover 11. Eyes Without A Face 12. Kings And Queens Of The Underground 13. Don’t Shoot The Messenger 14. Kiss Me Deadly 15. King Rocker 16. Running With the Boss Sound 17. Rebel Yell ——————– 18. LA Woman GARY MOORE setlist: 1. Dunluce 2. Over the Hills and Far Away 3. Thunder Rising 4. Military Man 5. Days Of Heroes 6. Where are you know 7. So Far Away 8. Empty Rooms 9. Old Wild One 10. Blood of Emeralds 11. Out in the Fields 12. Still Got the Blues 13. Walking by Myself ——————– 14. Parisienne Walkways
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