Location: Klub Boogaloo / Zagreb / Croatia
Concert date: May 18, 2007
Attendance: 500
Ticket price: 120/150 Kn
Oho-ho! Tonight we’ll be saying “Dobar dan!” a whole lot, because we’re heading to Croatia. We’re going to see Mr. Paul Gilbert, the famed guitarist of Mr. Big and Racer X, a man who belongs in the same league as Steve Vai’s devilishly well-oiled, spider-gripped fingers. The guy is a perfectly built guitar-playing machine. He’s got the speed, the precision and, most importantly, the witty ideas that sparkle especially through his personal, confessional run of solo studio albums, and in Zagreb Paul presented the latest one, “Get Out Of My Yard” (RockLine review HERE).
With Thomas and Jernej, two of RockLine’s big music experts on guitar heroes and this kind of stage circus act, a great time was guaranteed. I’d really missed that feeling. Of course, we dutifully seasoned the situation with plenty of beer. We found Klub Boogaloo, naturally, but this time we didn’t get lost much. The last time we were in there was for the show by ex-Black Sabbath singer Tony Martin, in November 2005.
Boogaloo is a great spot for putting on adventures like a Paul Gilbert show, which usually draws around 500 people (give or take 200). Truth be told, I’d expected a bigger turnout in Zagreb! Still, by 22.00 about 500 people had crammed in, and there was room in the hall for twice as many!
HARD TIME: 22.00 – 22.45
The ear massage and warm-up before Paul Gilbert came courtesy of the legendary Croatian rockers Hard Time. Bandleader Gordan Penava – Pišta, lead vocals and rhythm guitar and also the organizer of the Paul Gilbert show, proved himself even before the gig, welcoming us warmly and showing a thoroughly professional approach even earlier. He was extremely decent toward our outlet, too, sending back a lightning-fast answer to our request!
I watched these guys, Hard Time, last year opening for Motorhead at Zagreb’s “Stari Klaonici.” Hard Time were a brilliant choice to open for Motorhead. This time it was a bit less of a fit, but in the end, who cares. Over three quarters of an hour of their material, the guys made it clear that they carry a hell of a lot of confidence, that Pišta is still an indestructible old rocker at heart, and that he’s got the routine of an authoritative leader who steers his Hard Time with undiminished composure, which really sparkled through the stretch of time the band was given. It’s also incredible once again how Croatian bands have big balls on stage. The directness and arrogance they launched out of their experience of dirty, rolling rock’n’roll and a raw attitude! Pišta, in great spirits, was supremely talkative and strung the songs together with an excellent sense of humor. The crowd was fairly reserved during the set. It’s obvious that Hard Time shows in Zagreb aren’t all that rare, and people are used to them and know the band very well. Still, we all dutifully played along with Pišta’s orders from the stage. Ivan Mihaljević – Miha was having his day on guitar again and showed off clean, unbelievably fast soloing, scattering a heap of notes all over the place. A superb execution, with solos in the classical Satriani style rather than from some dirty, self-taught ex-“bluesman”, which is what you’d expect to find in the Hard Time lineup given the genre’s directness. Pišta wildly shredded his vocal cords and dug into his guitar, while the band spewed out a primal dose of brutally wild rock n’roll. As expected, the guys topped off a solid, intense set with their biggest hit, the extremely wound-up Kiss My Ass And Go To Hell.
Hard Time are a perfect party cranked all the way up. They openly incite the crowd to disobedience and to pleasures and temptations of Luciferian proportions. On top of that, they have a seriously intense stage presence that simply pulls you into a whirlpool of madness! This is the kind of rock’n’roll intensity that I badly miss in Slovenia, where what’s mostly in demand is the “self-pity” of frustrated souls of pretty young boys (Siddharta, Bohem, etc…)! Hard Time – thank you for a first-class rock’n’roll bomb!
PAUL GILBERT: 23.30 – 01.15
Hard Time got us properly fired up and sucked us in, and then the curtains closed again. This time only for half an hour and a break for “još jednu pivu”, and then Paul Gilbert appeared on stage with his backing band, in his trademark getup and with protective earplugs in his ears. In recent years, ever since he suffered hearing damage (tinnitus) and went almost deaf in one ear, Paul hardly ever takes his earplugs off. If you ask me, what he’s doing could easily make him a role model for other “fearless” musicians whose ears put up with sound levels of 150dB and more day after day. Besides Paul, two of the better-known rockers who’ve recently fallen victim to hearing damage are Lars Ulrich and James Hetfield of Metallica.
Besides Paul, the Paul Gilbert band consists of Mike Szutzer on bass, a drummer who already visited our parts last year as a member of Croatian guitarist Shime’s lineup (Postojna show, Ljubljana show), who lives and works in the USA, a guy by the name of Jeff Bowders. Last but not least on the list is Paul’s brand-new wife (March 2006) and keyboardist, the Japanese-born Emi Gilbert. As a curiosity, it’s worth mentioning that Paul’s current backing band is also the core of the backing group on the current G3 tour, which runs parallel to Gilbert’s aforementioned promo tour. This year, with Vai absent, Satriani surrounded himself with the guitar duo of Gilbert and Petrucci.
Paul and his fearless, hard-hitting band entertained us for the next two hours. Thanks to Croatian disorganization and freedom in this area, the band started the show fairly late even for rockers like us, at 23:30 sharp, and so bumped our already slightly sluggish biorhythm up to working level. The repertoire consisted mostly of songs from Paul’s latest album, with the telling title Get Out of My Yard, plus older material from his time and work with Mr. Big and Racer X, whose virtuosity was none other than Paul. It’s worth noting that Gilbert has plenty of room to maneuver here, since his solo career spans a full 10 studio albums, and the bonus material from those bands is likewise made up of original songs written by Gilbert himself. The show was dynamic and smoothly routine, with no needless stalling or dragging things out with chatter between songs and so on. Paul obviously swears by the saying that music speaks for itself, and he’s also clearly aware that more than 90% of his audiences are made up of all kinds of musicians, mostly guitarists, who would rather watch his fingers and listen to his music than put up with American political outbursts. So the mic doesn’t stay completely silent, Paul sometimes stretches his vocal cords a little too, and certain songs sound especially comical as a result. As a vocalist/guitarist he’s no Steve Vai, but he definitely far outdoes Joe Satriani, who, after trying this sort of thing and releasing one unsuccessful album, wisely dropped the habit
As for the backing band itself, you could say nothing but praise, because they squeezed out the very best. Bassist Mike, besides his fairly tricky lines, has no problem playing the famous Sheehan Mr. Big bass lines everyone knows. If we added a harmonizer and stereo connect for the guy it would be 100%, but even without them he didn’t let us connoisseurs down. As a special touch, the guy plucks his bass with both his fingers and a pick, which at moments lets his burnt-out fingers cool off at least a little. Drummer Jeff Bowders is already a familiar guest around here, and in his home lineup this time too he showed his true worth. His harmonic playing could easily be compared to Mike Mangini or the far better-known legendary Terry Bozzio, with one important difference. His drum kit is stripped down by a factor of at least 6 compared to Terry’s, and yet Jeff still manages to play everything required. Keyboardist Emi has obviously found her place in the band thanks to their fresh love and musical bond, which is probably the guiding thread between the Gilbert spouses. Her technical side needs no words, because in my opinion the girl could easily go for the keyboardist spot in Dream Theater.
Hendrix’s “Foxy Lady” followed, then “You Kids”, and Paul & Co. left us for good. Visibly satisfied, we walked out of the hall, each of us wondering to ourselves how the “h****a” he pulls it off. Guess we’ll have to practice a bit more…, and Paul definitely gave Zagreb a real Hard Time.
Text: HARD TIME (Aleš Podbrežnik), PAUL GILBERT (Thomas Breznik)
Photos Jernej Vene & Thomas Breznik
Setlist
HARD TIME:
1. Ja sam ono što plaši te
2. Nema povratka
3. Hoću sad i hoću sve
4. Zombie
5. Ništa il’ sve
6. Ja sam slobodan
7. Hit & Run
8. Everybody Wants To Be Alone
9. Ja nisam normalan
10. Kiss My Ass And Go To Hell
PAUL GILBERT:
1. Get Out Of My Yard
2. Hurry Up
3. Castle Dragon
4. Rusty Old Boat
5. Teeth Are A Drumset
6. Eruption
7. Spaceship One
8. I Like Rock
9. Scarified
10. Tech. Difficulties
11. Green Tinted
12. Twelve Twelve
13. Nothing But love
14. Addicted To That Rush
15. Mt – Fuji Xmas
16. Interaction
17. To Be With You
18. Down to Mexico
—encore—
19. Three E`s For Edward
20. Haydn Symphony
21. Not Affraid Of Police
22. Foxy Lady
23. You Kids
Photo Gallery
