Venue: Orto Bar / Ljubljana / Slovenia
Concert date: December 17, 2010
Attendance: 150
Ticket price: €5.00
Holy hell. Does anyone still remember the last time you could take a glam rock missile straight to the face in Slovenia? Those events are few and far between, which makes them all the more precious. Especially when it’s Slovenian bands keeping alive the legacy of melodic rock “sleaze” from the turn of the eighties into the nineties.
For this revival of the basic traits (and consequences) of hairspray abuse, or just plain old “eighties” kitsch in the spirit of Poison, Motley Crue and Skid Row, the little stage at Orto Bar hosted the up-and-coming, fresh-out-of-the-oven Tomcat and the already traditional glam merrymakers from Brežice, Broken Arrow. Even a random hawk-eyed, unsuspecting concertgoer could quickly spot two former “veterans” of the prematurely defunct Cyclone from Kranj in the Tomcat lineup. Two “ex-Cyclone guys,” that is, who clearly decided to hit the road together again after the split of their mother band on May 28, 2010. The one and only “Father of the Slovenian glam revival,” always dressed to the nines, Gregor Šujica, and his inseparable sidekick Anže Čuk. Tomcat and Broken Arrow, then! A great platform for a party of high expectations, and skipping this glitter-covered event would have been downright heresy.
The show was officially announced for 9:30 PM, but at nine Orto Bar was still frighteningly empty. Considering how rarely this kind of music turns up on the Slovenian scene, glam gigs usually draw a solid crowd. Sure enough, it took just 30 minutes from that observation for the unwarranted fear to vanish completely, as the upper concert hall filled up to the last corner. Tomcat lost their live virginity at exactly 9:30 PM! Despite some minor technical problems, they warmed up the crowd nicely with evergreen glam rock / hard-heavy rock numbers: Breaking the chains (Dokken), Rock you like a hurricane (Scorpions), Doctor doctor (U.F.O.). Tomcat being perfectionists, the lineup of two guitarists, a bassist, a drummer and two vocalists invited extra vocal help onto the stage. So one more female and one more male singer took the stage, which without a doubt made for a great overall impression. Anyone who follows this kind of music knows that polished, multi-part vocal harmonies in seductively punchy choruses are simply part of the good manners of the genre. An hour of playing, nine songs! The crowd’s heads were warmed up to just the right temperature, and not even the band’s minor sound hiccups could spoil the good mood.
After Tomcat, the “Broken Arrowheads” took the stage, pompous but a little tipsy, welcomed by the crowd with enthusiastic applause as they climbed onto the wooden boards. Over a nineteen-song set, they brought their cheerfully tinted, Bon Jovi-inspired brand of rock right under the audience’s skin, which also fits the look of their “shaggy-maned” frontman Matjaž Predanič. No keyboards this time. At a brisk tempo, Broken Arrow hopped between originals and evergreen classics. The Van Halen epic Dance the night away pumped the blood straight to the crowd’s heads, and right after it they poured oil on the fire with their by now classic “arrowhead” attraction, We ride. Once the guys onstage realized the crowd was following them with total devotion, they hit us with Bad boys (Whitesnake), which caused a proper little earthquake in the hall and made the wooden floor of Orto Bar sway dangerously. For an encore after the regular set, they warmed every Christmas soul with the folk classic “Na božično noč”, the kind of tune that would easily melt even the most hardened anti-metal heart into the climax of this evening at Orto Bar.
Let me wrap up this report in the spirit of Christmas-season boozing. By the end of the show the alcoholic derivatives were running short, so to everyone’s great sadness the upper floor of Orto Bar emptied out pretty quickly. The rather steep price of beer was probably to blame. I can’t think of any other explanation, given the well-known fact that a glam-metal crowd is not easily dragged out of its party gallop, which likes to stretch into the early morning hours. Let’s just hope we won’t have to wait another whole year for a similar event at Orto Bar.
photos: Martin Prezelj
text edited by: Aleš Podbrežnik
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