Location: Vienna / Wiener Stadthalle / Austria
Date: Wednesday, 06/29/2011
There’s been a lot of talk about the unbelievable pairing of two bands who decided to join forces and hit the road together. In terms of music and mission, embodiments of standards carved out of completely different worlds. Judas Priest and Whitesnake. You’re probably rolling your eyes and shaking your head right now. But those are the facts.
Judas Priest have been cooking up this tour for a long time. They wanted to wrap up their career with it. Close the book in the best way possible. There come years of wisdom when all you can do is hand out sound advice and nothing more. You built your reputation 30 years ago and have been resting on your laurels for 15. Eventually the time comes when you say, “That’s enough,” and you’re fully entitled to it. More than that. You were entitled to it years ago. Judas Priest named the tour accordingly: “Epitaph”.
On the other hand, there’s Whitesnake, commanded of course by none other than David Coverdale. Unlike Judas Priest, they absolutely do not admit, at least in outward activity and the language of diplomacy, that it’s time to think about retirement. Coverdale and his considerably younger sidekicks in the Whitesnake crew put out a fresh studio album this year that sounds really good and is well worth a spin. They gave it the title “Forevermore”, which hints that things can’t possibly end for David Coverdale.
Whatever the alibis for each band’s grand gestures in 2011, the two of them share quite a few similarities today. The first is the state of both frontmen’s pipes, which are knocking on the door announcing that the vocal cords’ expiry date is up. If that similarity has been bringing them together for about five years, the second one is a bit more recent. Lineup changes. When K. K. Downing leaves the band, the man who co-built the foundations of modern heavy metal with Judas Priest, that’s a very serious problem. No matter that the planet is crawling with kids who shred guitar so nobly that they carry the Judas Priest discography in their little finger, K.K.’s figure on stage is irreplaceable. He has to be there, otherwise there’s no definition of a “heavy metal duo”, even if, after waking up from the nightmare a few times, you somehow hold on to the definition of Judas Priest without Downing and get over his departure. On the other hand, Coverdale, after reuniting Whitesnake a few years ago, simply sticks with a lineup of rock “roughnecks” rather than splendid bluesmen. Hence the much heavier new sound of the band, which, when playing the older anthems, no longer embodies the real charisma of Whitesnake’s golden-age swagger and the core Moody/Marsden partnership. Yes. You could say that by 2011 the rock giants (Whitesnake) and the metal giants (Judas Priest) have both gotten their teeth chipped a bit.
At the last minute, just a month earlier, it was officially confirmed that another pioneering band from the encyclopedia of rock culture was joining both acts for the European leg of the tour. Thin Lizzy, with the foundation of twin-guitar harmony that classic heavy metal, led by the N.W.O.B.H.M. movement, soon picked up in the early eighties. The grotesque thing is that, given how things went after that watershed date for Thin Lizzy, 01/04/1986, today’s Thin Lizzy without Phil Lynott have a really hard time justifying their name. With a “tribute to” prefix, it would go through without a peep.
Thin Lizzy got back together in a rebuilt lineup a year ago. Even the closest thing to classic Lizzy, once Phil Lynott was gone and neither Brian Robertson nor (the late) Gary Moore showed any interest in reactivating their work in the band. Scott Gorham managed to convince original drummer Brian Downey, and there’s another welcome addition in keyboardist Darrel Wharton. Some of you might also know Wharton from the great AOR outfit Dare. Here’s the Lizzy element of glam-shock clowning and fun, a man who comes and goes. Marco Mendoza on bass. The singer’s spot went to Almighty frontman Ricky Warwick. Alongside Scott Gorham, Vivian Campbell should have been on stage too, but he skipped the Thin Lizzy tour because of his commitments to Def Leppard. His boots on this tour were filled by Richard Fortus from the current incarnation of Axl Rose’s Guns N’ Roses.
A lineup patched together like that, of course, didn’t leave a bad impression. With a selection of classics like that, it simply can’t. In half an hour they properly warmed up the packed floor of Vienna’s Stadthalle with a run of marching anthems, opened by Are You Ready and then built up one after another by Waiting For An Alibi, Jailbait, Don’t Believe A Word, Whiseky In A Jar, The Boys Are Back In Town and closing with Bob Seger’s Rosalie.
Everything runs nicely oiled. Warwick successfully keeps up the legacy of John Sykes, a guy with a mid-pitched, slightly nasal register and a dash of macho play-acting; Gorham, whose ripening charm reminds you more and more of Donald Sutherland; and then the young, big-nosed powerhouse of short stature, Fortus, in well-rehearsed combinations. The most active part of the entertainment in the Thin Lizzx crew is Marco Mendoza, next to whom Lizzy wouldn’t need stage lighting at all, since Marco’s “million dollar smile” and the shine of his polished porcelain teeth take care of that for the band. An active, dynamic and thoroughly high-quality execution. The sound? Decent, but not perfect. You couldn’t hear Wharton at all. For fans of the band who can live with the fact that the stamp, charisma, persona and work of Phil Lynott are irreplaceable, today’s Thin Lizzy are simply a must-see.
At exactly eight in the evening, Whitesnake were on stage. An hour and twenty minutes. A setlist built from songs off the new album and the mega hits that can’t be missing from the set. No need to waste words, since they repeat from one Whitesnake show to the next over the past decade or so. Coverdale has money, he has the name. So he buys the best musicians. And they really do play flawlessly. Guitar slingers Reb Beach and Doug Aldrich take a hefty bundle of minutes in the middle after Forevermore to stretch out the running time while Coverdale rests his vocal cords in the background, and after Love Will Set You Free, Brian Tichy is already waiting for his solo drum workout. Of course the solo spots bring a full dose of fun, especially Tichy’s bare-handed drumming. Bravura escapades all over the place.
The sound was very decent too. Whitesnake, who thoroughly overhauled the lineup in 2010 with Tichy, bassist Michael Devin and keyboardist Michael Ruedy, weathered the storms, especially in delivering the must-have classics, which in the opening stretch were Give Me All Your Love, Love Ain’t No Stranger and Is This Love. The whole backing crew supports Coverdale on vocals, and he also gets a lot of help from the mixing desk, which shows in the cranked-up echo effect and even the occasional pre-recorded backing track that includes those long-forgotten “giant” screams. The shortened Slide It In, which suddenly flowed into Fool For Your Lovin’, is a weird move from the band and not exactly a friendly gesture toward the classic, let alone the crowd. But that’s how it goes these days. The more impressive moments are from the new album, the new Forevermore with its classic acoustic intro, and the catchy Love Will Set You Free, which works great live. The concert peak came with Here I Go Again and one of the finest pieces of Whitesnake’s career, Still Of The Night, which help you quickly forget the woes of David Coverdale’s worn-out voice. When David retreats into a vocal delivery with added gruffness, overdoing it, he occasionally just rasps. The guys play great, they’re definitely too rough for Fool For Your Lovin’, but you’ve got to make peace with that.
It’s very likely that this tour with Judas Priest will be followed by a standalone band tour, where Whitesnake will present themselves with a wider repertoire and pay tribute to the new record “Forevermore”. Let’s wait a month or so and we’ll see what freshly booked tours are in store for 2012.
And finally, the main attraction of the night. Metal titans, fathers of the metal bible. Judas Priest. They really went all out. A spacious stage with huge backdrops and a huge projection screen. As always. Travis’s drums are raised, steps lead up to them, and the platform is widened so the other band members can stand on it too. Left and right on the stage, giant Judas Priest crosses rise up.
Monitors completely hidden. Left and right in front of the curtain and next to the projection screen, enormous chains. Priest hit the stage with the Battle Hymn intro at 9:45 p.m. But this intro doesn’t flow into One Shot At Glory, sadly. And this time it doesn’t matter. “Are You Rady for some Judas Priest heavy metal style!” Rapid Fire and the shooting from all positions begins. The sound is optimal from the very first second, especially at the back of the floor. Excellent sonic characteristics. You barely turn your head and we’re already in Metal Gods. People lose it. Most of the crowd is here tonight for Priest, and they’ve prepared an extraordinary setlist drawn from every record of the “Halford” era. With the right historical “gems”. Of course Rob Halford got most of the crowd’s attention thanks to his standard stage get-up, a combination of a steel metal messiah and a steel angel in one. Costume changes like on an assembly line. The “Metal God” was totally in command this time. Really? Minus the worn-out vocal cords, of course. The summer shows in Europe in June 2008 got confirmation, with the new experience of Vienna’s Stadthalle, that Rob must indeed have been sick back then. If you know Rob’s approach on the studio album “Made In Metal” (2010), that’s a good cue for getting a feel for how Halford handled his vocal range on the stage of Vienna’s Stadthalle too.
He noticeably steered clear of the higher and highest registers, but sounded totally in command in the lower and mid ranges. In June 2008 he couldn’t even pull those together decently. This time he wisely saved his voice and only here and there let out a scream, summoning up for the crowd those moments of old glory and the vocal greatness and uniqueness that embody the timeless figure of Judas Priest and Rob himself. Yes. At times it was clear that the added “screams” were on a backing track, which didn’t escape even the hardest of hearing in Painkiller (in the closing stretch of the show). But without any sense of pretension. Where it didn’t work, it just didn’t work, and Rob diligently kept at it and defied the odds down lower. Besides, Rob didn’t hide that he was feeling great. He kept in touch with the crowd the whole time, and many times he planted himself like a statue or a bust monument left and right on the stage and stared motionless ahead and into the audience. For Hell Bent For Leather he rode onto the stage on a motorbike, of course, dismounted, and wrapped himself in an Austrian flag, with which he unbuttoned the second encore. Naturally, the hall couldn’t stay indifferent to that gesture. During the breaks Rob took everyone through the history of Judas Priest. He introduced almost every song by recounting the background of how it came to be. Fantastic. Even in those intros alone, Rob had the crowd hooked with his incredible charisma. Between Hell Bent For Leather and You’ve Got Another Thing Coming, Rob’s standard “Shout Oh Yeah!” bit wasn’t missing, as he forced the audience into vehement vocal-cord stretching when we sailed into the closing chorus of that song. In short. Halford did the best he could in 2011. Even though he can’t pull off vocal miracles anymore, his presence in Judas Priest is simply irreplaceable. So much for Rob.
The Hill-Travis rhythm section is indestructible. While the quiet Ian, always working from the background, is the best kind of Ian, standard, extremely reliable and simply the backbone of Judas Priest, Scott put a spell on everyone with his exceptional drumming technique and know-how, which enriched all the Priest classics and gave them a completely refreshed look in which they come across even more furious and relentlessly snarling. The drum sound was fantastic and Scott ruled the stage all by himself, earning some thunderous ovations in the lightning-quick transitions and especially in the overture to Painkiller.
The key point that stirred things up this time was, of course, the guitar work. Glenn Tipton wasn’t keeping company with K.K. Someone else was. He looked very much like K.K. Just considerably younger. Richie Faulkner. A completely unknown name who first caught attention as part of singer Lauren Harris’s backing band, daughter of Steve Harris, bassist of the famous Iron Maiden. Faulkner took over the basic role of K.K. Downing. He took over his stage outfit, even his hairstyle. He took over his guitar gear, strapped with the same brands and types of guitars K.K. used. And he justified this place of honor with a brilliant stage performance and playing that even in his movement on stage recalled K.K. Downing. It was precisely his excellent command of the Judas Priest repertoire that earned Faulkner so many winning points that the Judas Priest show kept the whole pedigree of its former greatness from the classic days with K.K. in the lineup. Faulkner is a truly excellent guitarist. On some solos he actually got within an inch of K.K.’s originals, and the ones where he didn’t step exactly into his predecessor’s shoes he shaped tastefully and in line with the essence of the classic Priest repertoire. Tipton and company can trust Faulkner 100%. Priest treated Richie extremely decently. They accepted him as one of their own. Not a single member showed a shred of superiority toward him. In songs like Hell Bent For Leather and Breaking The Law, Faulkner and Tipton of course didn’t forget to do the “plucking” shoulder to shoulder. That’s one of those metal standards Priest were the first to present to the planet. Excellent playing from both guitarists. Great dynamics, great feel. To be honest, I’d have preferred to see K.K. in Faulkner’s place in any case, but it’s obvious that in the given situation, with the “newborn golfer” who decided on early retirement, Priest optimized things with Faulkner and can therefore ride on with plenty of flexibility, totally relaxed and unburdened.
Judas Priest surprised with a few exceptional picks. The first was Never Satisfied from the debut studio album “Rocka Rolla” (1974), and before it Starbreaker (“Sin After Sin”, 1977), while one of the setlist highlights of the show was the performance of the mini-epic from the album “Ram It Down” (1988), Blood Red Skies.
The seasoning of fantastic creations Heading Out To The Highway, The Sentinel, Night Crawler, Beyond The Realms Of Death and Turbo Lover managed, with little effort, to keep people hypnotized in the unique Judas Priest world that unspooled in front of us over a good two hours. Plenty of pyro, bursts of smoke, especially at the start and the end of the show, a whole Breaking The Law that Halford handed over to the crowd. Three encores.
All in all, a great experience that’s worth every euro invested in a ticket. You have to make peace with the fact that the band isn’t spring-chicken young anymore. Even so, with brilliant playing they easily still command a gigantic stage construction and set, with all the generous spice of laser light effects and pyrotechnic eruptions.
The question is how many shows the band has left. Every one that Priest still play today might also be the last. And despite the thorough weighing of whether Priest can still be Priest on stage after K.K. Downing’s departure, or whether they can justify their name after K.K. left, the fact is that Priest can keep rolling without K.K. The Vienna show confirmed that in every way. It was more than excellent. Shock-show theater therapy! Full of effects, of unique Priest magic, of the unique metal bible of the band! We don’t know what will happen to Priest in the future. Will they really stop? Will they gather some more energy and extend their career for a new studio album? The tour ahead of the band’s announced retirement is worth every visit, especially for those who have never seen Judas Priest on stage in their lives. It’s quite likely that after the “Epitaph” tour there will never be another. Considering what Judas Priest have given and brought us with their music over the years, they earned their rest, with the highest honors, long ago, in blood and sweat. Whether or not this is RockLine’s last Judas Priest live report, I can only say one thing. “Thank you, metal gods!”
author: Aleš Podbrežnik
photos: Jože Hvala, Aleš Podbrežnik (only the far bottom-right photo of Judas Priest)
THIN LIZZY:
1. Are You Ready
2. Waiting For An Alibi
3. Jailbreak
4. Don’t Believe A Word
5. Whiskey in the Jar
6. Cowboy Song
7. The Boys Are Back In Town
8. Rosalie
WHITESNAKE:
1. Best Years
2. Give Me All Your Love
3. Love Ain’t No Stranger
4. Is This Love
5. Steal Your Heart Away
6. Forevermore
7. Guitar solo (Doug Aldrich/Reb Beach)
8. Love Will Set You Free
9. Drum Solo (Brian Tichy)
10. Slide It In
11. Fool For Your Lovin’
12. Here I Go Again
13. Still Of The Night
JUDAS PRIEST:
1. Battle Hymn (intro)
2. Rapid Fire
3. Metal Gods
4. Heading Out To The Highway
5. Judas Rising
6. Starbreaker
7. Victim Of Changes
8. Never Satisfied
9. Diamonds & Rust
10. Dawn Of Creation (intro)
11. Prophecy
12. Night Crawler
13. Turbo Lover
14. Beyond The Realms Of Death
15. The Sentinel
16. Blood Red Skies
17. The Green Manalishi (With The Two-Pronged Crown)
18. Breaking The Law
19. Painkiller
—encore I.—
20. The Hellion
21. Electric Eye
—encore II.—
22. Hell Bent For Leather
23. You’ve Got Another Thing Comin’
—encore III.—
24. Living After Midnight
