Joe Perry Project - City Hall Sheffield 4th April 2010
Approx Setlist: Let the Music do the Talking / ?Walkin' The Dog? / ?Slingshot? / Vigilante Man / Somebody's Gonna Get Their Head Kicked In / Wooden Ships / Looking Pretty, Pretty / Train Kept A Rollin’ / Walk This Way
I rarely get to a gig with the intention of seeing the support band. If I do catch the opening act, it is generally accidental. Unless, that it is, it is someone of the calibre of Joe Perry (or Eric Burdon, or Uriah Heep, for example.) I had no intention of missing this support band.
Let’s make no mistake about one fact: Joe Perry is cooler than the other side of the pillow. What is more, for a guy who should really have been dead in 1980, he looks bloody good! I make no apologies for the fact that I am a huge fan and totally biased in my opinion.
The comparisons between Steven Tyler/Joe Perry and Mick Jagger/Keith Richards are inevitable. Both are great guitar players who can actually sing, but they both have the big-lipped singers, from whom they seem to be virtually inseparable (no matter how much, or how many times, they try to divorce each other).
Let’s make no mistake about one fact: Joe Perry is cooler than the other side of the pillow. What is more, for a guy who should really have been dead in 1980, he looks bloody good! I make no apologies for the fact that I am a huge fan and totally biased in my opinion.
The comparisons between Steven Tyler/Joe Perry and Mick Jagger/Keith Richards are inevitable. Both are great guitar players who can actually sing, but they both have the big-lipped singers, from whom they seem to be virtually inseparable (no matter how much, or how many times, they try to divorce each other).
Tonight’s gig was very special for me (see Bad Company review for more). Although I have seen Aerosmith live twice before, to see Joe play in a small venue is something else entirely. That old, constant nagging fear was still present though: Had I built up tonight to something that it could never realistically achieve?
The last time I saw a band at Sheffield City Hall was thirty years ago but I was pleased to see that it is still a fantastic venue. However, even though I worked in this great city for six years, have been here more times than I can count, as with Birmingham, I always get lost in the one way system; tonight was no exception. I can go to a city I have never been to before, anywhere in the world and find a venue straight away, yet places I know well, I still get lost. It is a fact of life that I live with…
By the time I had driven round the city a couple of times, ended up on the road to Glossop, found my way back into the city, parked, and made it to City Hall, Joe had already taken to the stage. We found our seats (Row A) and settled in. Nazis were patrolling, pouncing on anyone who had the temerity to point a camera at the stage. (I will not rant about that here, my feelings about these fascist humps are well-known. Keep checking my Rants section!)
The last time I saw a band at Sheffield City Hall was thirty years ago but I was pleased to see that it is still a fantastic venue. However, even though I worked in this great city for six years, have been here more times than I can count, as with Birmingham, I always get lost in the one way system; tonight was no exception. I can go to a city I have never been to before, anywhere in the world and find a venue straight away, yet places I know well, I still get lost. It is a fact of life that I live with…
By the time I had driven round the city a couple of times, ended up on the road to Glossop, found my way back into the city, parked, and made it to City Hall, Joe had already taken to the stage. We found our seats (Row A) and settled in. Nazis were patrolling, pouncing on anyone who had the temerity to point a camera at the stage. (I will not rant about that here, my feelings about these fascist humps are well-known. Keep checking my Rants section!)
I wanted pictures of tonight though and was puzzled to find that my camera had a capacity for 7 photographs. WTF? Eh? I’ve got an 8GB memory card… in the card reader of the laptop, 60 miles away. Ah. Hmmm. Er… Arse!
I can’t believe I forgot the memory card. Of course I had a spare one in my wallet. Which was in my bag at home, having put it back there after removing my credit card from it, before leaving.
OK. SO, this was not going to be easy. I knocked the quality down a couple of notches on the camera, enough to give me quality for pictures on the screen, but allow me a few more than seven shots. Using no flash, this was not going to be easy. Even crap pictures would eat into my allocation. So, each picture had to be a good one. You know, like when they landed on the moon. Those astronauts, in their pressurised suits, using an unmodified camera that they couldn’t see, or focus, with a shutter release button that they couldn’t feel. Well, if they could manage to take a perfect photo every time, so could I!
I can’t believe I forgot the memory card. Of course I had a spare one in my wallet. Which was in my bag at home, having put it back there after removing my credit card from it, before leaving.
OK. SO, this was not going to be easy. I knocked the quality down a couple of notches on the camera, enough to give me quality for pictures on the screen, but allow me a few more than seven shots. Using no flash, this was not going to be easy. Even crap pictures would eat into my allocation. So, each picture had to be a good one. You know, like when they landed on the moon. Those astronauts, in their pressurised suits, using an unmodified camera that they couldn’t see, or focus, with a shutter release button that they couldn’t feel. Well, if they could manage to take a perfect photo every time, so could I!
Joe Perry is a legend and, in spite of being such, he comes across as a very down-to-earth bloke. He does what he does and that is that. It’s not about egos for Joe; it’s the music that matters to him, you can see that as plain as the Mallen streak in his hair. He made a point of telling us: “What you see is what you get, and what you get is what you see.” Fine with me, Joe.
You can always tell when a band is doing it because they are having a lot of fun. As they began to play one of Joe’s son’s band’s songs, Looking Pretty, Pretty, I’m not sure who got it wrong, but Joe stopped them. “(To the band) Look guys. We play this in the key of C. If we’re gonna play it, we might as well play it right. (To the audience) This might be the only time you ever get to see it.” They restarted it and it was good.
For me, the highpoint of a truly excellent set was a rendition of Woody Guthrie’s Vigilante Man, played very much in the style of Nazareth’s version, and a raucous the cover of Fleetwood Mac’s, Somebody’s Gonna To Get Their Head Kicked In. Bloody awesome! As I said at the beginning, I am highly biased in favour of Senor Perry, so they could have played the Sheffield Yellow Pages and I would have been happy as a pig in the proverbials.
You can always tell when a band is doing it because they are having a lot of fun. As they began to play one of Joe’s son’s band’s songs, Looking Pretty, Pretty, I’m not sure who got it wrong, but Joe stopped them. “(To the band) Look guys. We play this in the key of C. If we’re gonna play it, we might as well play it right. (To the audience) This might be the only time you ever get to see it.” They restarted it and it was good.
For me, the highpoint of a truly excellent set was a rendition of Woody Guthrie’s Vigilante Man, played very much in the style of Nazareth’s version, and a raucous the cover of Fleetwood Mac’s, Somebody’s Gonna To Get Their Head Kicked In. Bloody awesome! As I said at the beginning, I am highly biased in favour of Senor Perry, so they could have played the Sheffield Yellow Pages and I would have been happy as a pig in the proverbials.
The gig was simple: no frills, no crap, just Joe having the rock ‘n’ rolls again. Like the Ace Frehley gig that blew me away last year, Joe Perry and his band were absolutely awesome and rocked the house. It was everything I expected and more. I couldn’t have been more pleased. This is what it’s all about. A few new songs, some classics, a couple of covers; it doesn’t get much better. You can’t ask for more than that.
I’m with Joe on this one: Let the music do the talking…
That’ll do me.
Mark L. Potts
The God of Thunder
April 5th 2010
P.S: In total, I took eleven shots of Joe. I kept 9 of them. (I kept 49 out of 54 of Bad Co.) They’re not bad, you know, considering.
P.P.S. If anyone can correct the setlist, let me know.
I’m with Joe on this one: Let the music do the talking…
That’ll do me.
Mark L. Potts
The God of Thunder
April 5th 2010
P.S: In total, I took eleven shots of Joe. I kept 9 of them. (I kept 49 out of 54 of Bad Co.) They’re not bad, you know, considering.
P.P.S. If anyone can correct the setlist, let me know.