RocKdoc Reviews

     On Friday December 13, I saw Trans Siberian Orchestra at the BB&T Center, a large arena. The next night, I went to a very small venue, The Culture Room, in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida to see In Flames , one of the bands that was an innovator of melodic Swedish death metal.  I first saw In Flames at Copenhell 2013, in Copenhagen, Denmark.  I was impressed with the quality of the band's performance, so I was looking forward to seeing them again.  They have a new album out, I, the Mask and this tour is to support it.  Swedish melodic death metal is a sub genre of death metal in which the lead guitar often plays a more melodic lead, especially for the intro and solo, even using an acoustic guitar at times.  The vocals are still mostly guttural, but occasionally venture into a more harmonic voice. This makes the the music unique and the few bands that still belong to this genre interesting to follow.      There were two openers.  I missed the first, and wished I had missed the

      Though the Trans Siberian Orchestra comes to South Florida about this time every year, I never saw them before, as I always had plans or parties to attend.  This year, i cleared my schedule, as I wanted to see if what I had heard about TSO was true.  On December 13, they performed at the BB&T Center in Sunrise, Florida. I was more than impressed.  My girl friend, Jelena, who accompanied me and not really a fan of hard rock music, was impressed as well. TSO is not just a rock band, but a genuine orchestra with a string section, keyboards, a slew of vocalists, and even a flutist, beside the guitars and drums.  It is hard to describe how amazing all of the special effect were.  Lasers, moving backdrops, pyrotechnics, and even special effects that encircled the balcony gave a magical sense to the performance and their quality were some of the best I have ever seen.  The audience was very enthusiastic and much more polite as they kept their seats throughout the performance and it

      I have to admit that during the seventies and early eighties I wasn't much of a KISS fan.  I was listening to Zepplin, Sabbath, and Deep Purple with some Jethro Tull thrown in.  I felt the makeup was a diversion from the music that seemed rather simplistic to me.  It wasn't until I attended my first KISS concert that I became a fan.  Sometimes studio albums and even MTV videos tend to soften the music and eliminate some of the individual efforts such as solos that show the skill of the band members. The band consists of four members, Star Child Paul Stanley, lead vocals and rhythm guitar, Demon Gene Simmons, bass guitar and lead and backing vocals, Space Ace, Tommy Thayer, lead guitar and backing vocals, and Catman Eric Singer, drums and backing vocals.  The original line up included Ace Frehley on lead guitar and Peter Criss on drums.  Frehley and Criss left the band during the eighties, but returned several times only to leave again.  Frehley has had a fairly successful

      Thursday July 18, 2019 kicked off Iron Maiden's Legacy of the Beast Tour in Ft. Lauderdale and the BB&T Center .  Besides the wonderful music, Maiden always puts on a great show and Legacy was no different.  Iron Maiden is an iconic metal band that was begun by bassist Steve Harris in 1975, but really shot to the top when it added frontman Bruce Dickinson and its current lineup in the 1980s.  There were a few line up changes, but eventually the best line up emerged and continues to tour the world to massive audiences. They fly their own 747 jet airliner , piloted by Dickinson who has earned a commercial pilots license.   Iron Maiden has been a major of influence of power metal, especially in Europe.  The theme of Maiden's music is fittingly history, mythology, religion, and the dark side of the human psyche.       The opening act was an English band The Raven Age, whose lead guitarist just happened to be George Harris , son of bassist and founding member of

     I was very excited to see Greta Van Fleet.  This young band was said to have a Led Zeppelin style and so the moment tickets became available at the so called presale, I logged on and purchased mine.  The venue was the Bayfront Amphitheater in downtown Miami.  The last concert I attended there was Judas Priest"s Epithaph Tour, with Black Label Society, and Thin Lizzy some years ago.  I also bought a parking pass, but for some reason about three weeks later my money was refunded and I was told advanced parking was no longer available.  I used Uber as parking is a mess in downtown Miami.      I was disappointed to find that the location of the seats I had purchased were not in the 6th row as I saw on the Live nation venue diagram, but behind a significant section of seating in front.  I should have remembered that Ticketmaster and Live Nation often present a misleading diagram and hold back seats or overprice them at the presale and that sometimes better and cheaper seats becom

Uriah Heep set list       The Judas Priest concert on Friday May 3 at the Seminole Hard Rock Resort and Casino in Hollywood, Florida was full of surprises.   So I picked up my friend Matt Kramer, frontman of Saigon Kick, and we headed to the Seminole Hard Rock.  We got there just in time for the opening act.  I had bought the tickets a long time ago and had forgotten that the opener was Uriah Heep.  I had never seen them live, though I was fully aware of their music. The only original member is Mick Box on lead guitar and even at his age, he could really lay down great riffs.   Frontman Bernie Shaw and Keith Lanzon on keyboards have been with the band 33 years and drummer Russell Gilbrook for 16 years, so they were not fill ins.  Bassist Davey Rimmer is a newcomer joining in 2013.  This seasoned group of performers put on quite a show.  Their sound was fast, hard, and loud.  Since this was the opening night of the tour, their was no set list available.  My friend Matt was happy to