The Case for Sugar and Armageddon

The last time I was at the Vector Arena, I was disappointed to find my relatively expensive tickets had put me a fair way away from the stage and with a speaker stack between myself and the screen relaying events on stage.  This time around, for the Shotgun Alley, Heart and Def Leppard combo, there were no such location gaffes.  An early arrival and General Admission tickets meant that we were right up the front, 2 or 3 people away from the patrolled moat that separated the punters from the stage.

Being so early meant that we got to see every act in their entirety.  And that was definitely not a hardship.

Shotgun Alley was up first, dressed in their most trendy black jeans, in shirts that made their most of their physiques (sculpted abs, broad shoulders, strong arms), in their most militant looking boots, and wearing a few kilos worth of silver in the shape of skulls and other heavy metal icons, and of course with hair that looked so scruffily unique that it must have taken hours to get it looking quite that perfect.  I was not very well versed in their oeuvre before the show, but I have to say, with their head bangy set very tightly and professionally crafted, and a power ballad that is a bit more my thing, I was pretty well won over by the time they left the stage.  They weren’t up for long, it has to be said, but they set the night off to a great start, and the young girls who seemed to make up the biggest section of the audience who were evidently fans of theirs seemed suitably and screamably impressed too.

 
After a bit of a break, the lights dimmed and out popped rock divas Heart.  Off the top of my head, I could have identified one or two of their songs; by the end of their part of the show, I was surprised by how many of their songs I had recognised and, more importantly, enjoyed.  There were a few misfires: their tribute to their first trip to the Antipodes was to serenade the audience with pop Ocker John Farnham’s You’re the Voice, though I seemed more offended by the mistaken cultural identity than the vast majority of the audience; super sappy These Dreams from the 80s is definitely a classic but really did not seem to go very well with the rest of their set (especially considering that they did not attempt All I Want To Do Is Make Love To You) and while Nancy Wilson’s guitar playing skills were incredible, she seemed to struggle a little with the vocals; and then there was a very interesting “glitch” that led to a looped scream that had the whole band dash off the stage in embarrassment – it sounded like a the lip-synch track had got stuck, though the band recovered well enough, getting back on stage once that technical error had been resolved and never looking back (I had hoped the other reviews would elaborate on this from a more knowledgeable perspective; but they did not).

Overall though, the music was amazing.  Ann Wilson, all big boots and black hair, stomped backwards and forwards as if she were crushing cockroaches in her wake, belting out her notes with no care for the shattering of eardrums around the hall.  While Shotgun Alley walked around a little, the girls from Heart went on a walking tour of Auckland, Nancy Wilson’s trip cut a little short when her guitar lead refused to go the distance to the end of the runway with her.  As I looked around the audience, I noted one of the guitar players from Shotgun Alley (now incognito in an ab-covering t-shirt and with hair well combed) amongst the audience with us, perhaps taking some notes from a few seasoned professionals, both in what to do and what not to do.

A little sheepish after their gaffe, Heart headed off stage.  Therein followed a tense few minutes  while the stage set up was changed and I braced myself for a rush from behind of later-arriving fans who would crush the people near the stage.  Most of the people in the “pit” were dutifully wearing their Def Leppard t-shirts or dressed up in 80s-esque attire; I eschewed the former but kept the faith with the latter, with my black jeans doing my bogan talking, though my green “Say No to Kryptonite” t-shirt was decidedly not in keeping with the heavy metal theme of the evening.  In the end, despite a few attempts to make their way to the stage, the hordes were held at bay (though one young lass with quite lovely breasts decided to show her assets to the band and to the audience until she was asked to climb down off her boyfriend’s shoulders). 

However, I encountered an audience issue from a different object when the tall, imposing physique of Dennis from Fatso (well, not really, but he reminded me of him) decided to take a step back so that he could film all of his favourite songs with his digital camera.  As I had nowhere to go, I ended up with a lot less room than I had expected and the occasional long hair catching on my clothes.  Dennis was a well prepared individual though: he had staked his claim and arranged with friends to come to his position from wherever they were located at the back to bring him refreshments at various stages of the evening.  He also had a few packets of foam ear plus which he used and disposed of several times during the evening.  I am not sure if he managed to get one of the guitar picks that were thrown out at several stages of the evening, but I am sure, had he wanted one, his imposing size and determined attitude would have meant that he would have got one.

Settled, the lights dimmed, the drums started, the guitars exploded, and out strutted Def Leppard.  They have changed a bit from their 80s heyday, with Phil Collen looking a lot buffer and more waxed (he obviously wanted everyone to be impressed by his toned physique as he was shirtless the entire night), the other guitarists Vivan Campbell and Rick Savage and the drummer Rick Allen looking a little older though their hair looks almost the same, and Joe Elliot the lead singer was dressed in his sparkly silver shoes and with the buttons of his jacket all done up over his beer belly, and his hair looks much better cared for than it did back in the day.  Did age, which claims us all, mean anything?  Not at all.

These guys know how to rock, how to play, and how to perform.  A few of the songs may be easily mistaken for others, but there was no mistaking that they played all their hits and so they know exactly what their audience wanted.  Looking around, it was a pretty mixed crowd of people who encountered their music when it was first released and those who probably learned of their greatest era through their parents or much older siblings (bare chested girl included).  I suppose rock as cheesily hard as this never really goes out of style, as it can always be played loud and the lyrics are angrily earnest in an easily sung along to kind of way.  Rocket was I think the biggest song of the evening, and it got the whole stadium jumping up and down and screaming, and the boys went out to the end of the runway (so they had their backs to me, unfortunately) for a crowd-contributing acoustic version of Two Steps Behind.  Of course, Pour Some Sugar On Me and Love Bites also hit all audience’s buttons, but then almost every song did: there was almost no song that everyone hadn’t heard and which didn’t get everyone singing along and head banging along to the beat.

The show ended (well, apart from the encore) in an eerily familiar way, with me looking at their backs (again) as they stood at the end of the runway, waving into the audience – familiar, because I am sure that is one of the photos that accompany their album material.  Of course, in that photos, the T-shirts were a bit looser and grubbier, the jeans a bit more frayed and worn, the hair a bit more frazzled or actually there.  Seeing them there, striking that familiar pose, it was interesting to see how far that Def Leppard have come, both in time and distance; but it was wonderful to appreciate how much that they had managed to bring with them.

Verdict:  Quite a few different elements to review here: Shotgun Alley were impressive, engaging and seemed completely at ease, even if they didn’t have the polish of the later acts – 8 emos out of 10; Heart put a lot of soul into their performance, though at times not much brain and perhaps a bit of electronic assistance, though still they are class professionals and that voice – 7 barracudas out of 10; and Def Leppards cannot change their spots and continue to deliver the goods even if they mainly came to New Zealand to see the rugby – 10 photographs out of 10.  So an overall rating of the show of 9 heavy metal tonnes out of 10.