[TAorama]

Just saw this show last night. Well, most of it - didn't see Cinderella's set, but I've seen them before. I thought all the bands did great sets, and had pretty good energy despite how friggin' hot it was at the outside venue.

Firehouse and Quiet Riot did meet and greets after their sets, which was cool. The Firehouse guys were awesome, and just seemed like good dudes. Bill Leverty was playing a couple of nice figured-top Yamaha Pacificas. Do they still make those? He was also playing Framus amps, which sounded pretty good.

QR played a good set, despite DuBrow's velvet leopard-print catsuit. That aside, they were pretty solid. Alex Grossi was playing an obnoxious (but cool) bass-boat metal-flake silvery/rainbow sparkle PRS through Line 6 heads into Mesa cabinets.

Ratt was great! I had no idea that Jizzy Pearl was singing for them now. He did a pretty good job on vocals. Warren DiMartini did a killer set. What is he playing these days? It was hard to tell, but it almost looked like Fernandez?? At first I thought they were Charvels, but the headstock logo was NOT a Charvel logo - at least not one I recognized. I think he was running through Soldano heads into Marshall cabs, but it was a little hard to tell with such a crowded backline. Anyway, smokin performance. And when the hell did John Corabi start playing backup guitar for Ratt??? Man, I'm out of touch. I loved him as the singer for "The Scream", and thought he did pretty good as an axeman with Ratt. I'll overlook that nasty Motley Crue album, however...

Anyway, good show. If you get a chance to catch this tour, and you like hair-metal, you won't be disappointed.

 

[fettouhi]

Real 80'ties gig . Nice to see that Firehouse is still around.

Regards

André

 

[revsharp777]

How ironic. I start to read this thread & Winger's "Seventeen" starts playing on the radio. :lol:

I'd love to see the tour, but I have a few beefs with the bands.

Without Stephen Pearcy, there is no Ratt.
Without Carlos Cavazos & Rudy Sarzo, there is no Quiet Riot. I should know. I've seen them 3 times in the as many years.

 

[Flobanez]

You gotta have Stephen Pearcy in Ratt.
The original Quiet Riot would be cool to see.
Winger's Seventeen :lol: Reb Beach is great.

 

[TAorama]

I hate to admit it, but for the first few minutes, I thought it WAS Pearcy with Ratt. He sounded pretty good. But I was like "Wait, did he get hair implants or something?" Anyway, I agree - I prefer bands with their original lineups. Still, Ratt pretty much sounded like Ratt, and Warren DiMartini played a heck of a gig. I'd never been a big fan of Jizzy Pearl before (especially during LA Guns "experimental" period - ugh!), but I thought he was a good fit with Ratt. Good stage presence, and he really did justice to the old Ratt tunes.

As for QR, yeah, it should have been advertised as "Featuring Kevin DuBrow of Quiet Riot", instead of QR. Once again, though, the sounded really good.

Personally, the main reason I went was to see Firehouse. They're one of my absolute favorite bands, and this was the first time I'd ever seen them live. Getting to meet them was a nice bonus, too. I find it interesting that Bill Leverty wrote most of the songs on their latest CD, and even sings about half of them. He's got some side-project band he's in too, and I wonder if they just used some of his tunes to fill the CD. Don't get me wrong, it still SOUNDS like Firehouse, but I prefer CJ Snare's vocals. The guy has a killer 80's hair-metal voice, IMHO.

 

[bpd111]

It seems to me that Ratt minus Pearcy would be an improvement. I saw them during their "hair-day" and they sucked. Don't get me wrong, they were one of my favorite bands but their live show blew. Admittedly, I only saw the one show (heard a recording, and that was terrible too).

They just stood around on stage and didn't sound good. Poison smoked 'em that night. It was the Ratt Poison tour, heh heh.

 

[whatshisname]

Bill Leverty is using Pacifica Customs. They were recently discontinued, and were only available in Japan. Yamaha also makes a model called the 821d, which is similar, but it has a TRS trem, instead of the RM Pro, and it has dot inlays. Don't remember what pickups. Bill uses a JB in the bridge, and the middle and neck are stock dimarzios.(HS-2, and Air Norton I believe)

I'd like to check out a Framus, but I must admit that I liked Bill's tone much better, with the Yamaha Soldano, and the Rivera. The Framus seems to have a weird midrange, to me. I've only heard it on the FireHouse CD(Prime Time) though.

FireHouse is one of my alltime favorite bands. Michael Foster is THE best rock drummer in the world. The guy is so underrated, it's criminal. And, he sings his ASS off. CJ is a classicly trained(since he was six!) vocalist, and pianist. Allen was in the top Rush tribute band. Anyone who sees them knows that they have easily the best live vocals in the world. Some people think that they euse samples, but it's all live. A truely incredible band, that never gets their due.

Check out Bill's album "Wanderlust". I can't say enough about Bill. He's on a whole other level. The guy is definetly a virtuoso. www.leverty.com

Warren plays Performance guitars. Yep, the same company that Steve used to use. They did his original snakeskin guitars, his black Corsair, the Bugs Bunny, the koa guitars, and a few others. Now, they are making replicas of some of his old Charvels. I'm sure that's what he was playing.

While I wish RATT would get Pearcy back, Jizzy is a millions time the singer. Pearcy always seemed to suck, live.

Quiet Riot is still Quiet Riot, even without Carlos and Rudy. Chuck Wright even played a good deal of the parts that people think Rudy played on the old records. He's always been part of the family onstage, and in the studio. Carlos was far from the original guitarist, so even though he was part of the classic lineup, he wasn't an original member, either. The only two guys that were always there since the beginning, was Kevin, and Frankie. Actually, the lineup with Chuck Wright is closer to what you'd call an original lineup.

 

[JJEMMER777]

Warren DiMartini is da man!!!!

 

[JESTER700]

I like Firehouse a lot; saw them open for Tesla, I think. I like David Prater's production on the first album - very thick. And I also like Pacificas (especially the 921).

I dug Quiet Riot's first album back in the day (got it because of the RR connection, as I supect many others did), but they sure went downhill fast. And Dubrow always was a liability. A poor singer, and a loudmouth without the coolness factor.

 

[Ekim]

At least you didn't have Pearcy asking the crowd for weed like he did the last time I saw Ratt.

 

[Flobanez]

:lol: You'd think he'd get his own. Still, Pearcy is cool IMO. Ratt isn't the same without him.

 

[Knightmeir]

I opened this thread, and the first thing I saw was "Jizzy Pearl."

 

[Flobanez]

Warren DiMartini is da man!!!!

Yes!

 

[Polaris20]

Firehouse is absolutely awesome, and they are really nice guys. Bill especially is a really approachable dude.

The headlined a show in Chicago a few years back, and my friend's band opened for them....they were really nice people, and they sounded amazing!

 

[kelmaur]

i agree with you revsharp...RATT w/o Pearcy is not the same is it...Pearcy's voice and DeMartini's guitar was "the" RATT sound...i love RATT...

 

[ibanezcollector]

the opening intro to lay it down is still one of my favorite riffs of all time..

 

[carlos grijalva]

cool.