Photos: Aleš Podbrežnik
Location: Trieste / Teatro Miela (Dom pristaniških delavcev) / Italy
Concert date: November 30, 2014
Attendance: 300
Ticket price: €23.00 (advance) / €26.00 (day of show)
The Rockline.si crew wrapped up a packed November of gigs in the Littoral region, where we kept coming back through the late autumn days. This time, though, we stepped across the border to Trieste. The Trieste iz rock crew lured two bands down from chilly Sweden to the Dom pristaniških delavcev: H. E. A. T and Sherlock Brothers.
Swedish hard rock outfit H.E.A.T formed in 2007 when Dream and Trading Fate merged. The young six-piece was snapped up right away by the Swedish label StormVox, and the very next year they put out their debut, H.e.a.t. Even in the early days they were showing up on big stages as an opener for Toto, Sabaton and Alice Cooper. In seven years together they’ve released 4 albums, the latest just this year, titled Tearing down the walls. Like most young bands, H.E.A.T have been through a few lineup changes – one of the guitarists left in 2013, and they swapped out their frontman back in 2010. Kenny Leckremo was replaced on vocals by the winner of a 2009 Swedish talent show, the charismatic Erik Grönwall. Then came several successful years of gigging across Sweden and the rest of Europe, including opening for Scorpions and playing Sweden Rock Festival. In 2014 they hit the road on a European tour, this time as headliners.
Arriving in Trieste, there wasn’t much heat to speak of – what greeted us was rain. But even the sour weather couldn’t dampen our excitement. When we got there a little after eight in the evening, the opening act was already thundering out of the Dom pristaniških delavcev – fellow Swedes Sherlock Brothers. The five-piece have been joining H.E.A.T on the whole European tour and warming up the stage. Genre-wise, they sit somewhere between seventies rock groove and a dash of grunge. They released their second album, Monkey made nation, this September. What grabbed us was their high-energy music, and even more so their chaotic stage show. The guys ran wild all over the stage, and the frontman in particular showed off every one of his acrobatic skills, throwing himself from a high jump onto the hard stage floor more than once. Not once did he let on that any of those falls hurt. He kept a firm grip on his mic and carried on belting into it. Despite the tougher rhythms and crunchy riffs, the band sounded melodic enough that even those of us who are classic hard rock fans had a great time. Sherlock Brothers got a loud, encouraging round of applause at the end of the set, proof that we weren’t the only ones charmed.
The stage was quickly set for H.E.A.T, and soon Glenn Frey’s voice singing The heat is on, which the Swedish youngsters use as their intro, rang out of the speakers. After a good minute of buildup, we saw the band members file onto the stage one by one, slowly, to roaring applause. They kicked off with a punch, Point of no return. The guys on stage tamed the crowd right away and pulled it into their groove. A big part of that was their super-dynamic performance, with plenty of dancing around the stage, which left no one, on stage or off, indifferent. Frontman Erik Grönwall in particular didn’t stand still for a second. His stage presence reminded us at times of Axl Rose’s wild dancing in his prime, at other times of the charismatic Sebastian Bach in the late eighties, and on top of that he added a hefty dose of his own boyish charm, innocence and provocation. The youth of the H.E.A.T members is definitely an asset, because at their show you can relive a good chunk of the lively madness that bands brought to their gigs in the golden age of hard rock, up until the early nineties. Of course, despite all his energy and strong, reliable vocals, Grönwall couldn’t do it all alone – the singer is backed by a band that works like a solid, dependable machine, its dynamics complementing the visual and musical foundation on stage and leading the crowd into proper hard rock madness.
The band strolled easily through songs from their recently released album Tearing down the walls, and worked in a few hits from earlier records too. The crowd knew the older songs as well as the newer ones and happily sang along with the dancing Grönwall, who kept us entertained with his antics on stage for an hour and a half with no sign of fatigue. The sound in the hall was gorgeous. The performance was so tight and flawless that it wasn’t entirely clear whether we were watching a perfectly rehearsed show or a supremely relaxed musical experience. Judging by what we saw and heard, there’s no way to accuse the members of H.E.A.T of inexperience, young as they are. The synergy on stage was downright incredible, and it carried over the whole time to the fired-up crowd below. To crank up the magic even more, the frontman repeatedly strolled through the makeshift photo pit and climbed up on the barrier to greet individual fans in the front rows.
The minutes just flew by, and after Emergency the guys said goodnight and left the stage, but the crowd’s shouts soon called them back. In the encore we heard Breaking the silence and Living on the run, during which Erik decided to take a trip through part of the audience, carried around on the hands of the fans. Of course, the guy didn’t let go of the mic for a second and kept singing the whole way. Once he finally got back on his feet, he returned to the stage, and to the crowd’s great delight they played and sang one more, Laughing at tomorrow. Then came the real goodbye and the trip home, full of wonderful impressions left behind by the young Swedes. An energetic show, packed with flawless execution, that definitely deserves a repeat visit when the guys head back to our neck of the woods.
Setlist
1. Point of No Return
2. A Shot at Redemption
3. Better off Alone
4. Heartbreaker
5. It’s All About Tonight
6. Inferno
7. The Wreckoning
8. Tearing Down the Walls
9. Mannequin Show
10. Late Night Lady
11. Beg Beg Beg
12. All the Nights
13. Downtown
14. Enemy in Me
15. Emergency
—encore I—
16. Breaking the Silence
17. Living on the Run
—encore II—
18. Laughing at Tomorrow
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