After
a day's restful shopping and eating in sunny Nottingham I was re-energised
and ready for another full day of melodic rock, which is, more or less, what I
got...
Following
W.E.T.'s outstanding performance on the Friday I was looking forward to Sunday
openers Eclipse, which, for the
purposes of Firefest, at least, is basically W.E.T. sans Säll and JSS
(apart from his entirely anticipated guest appearance on one song) ,
and has the wonderful Erik Mårtennson up front and centre. The band played up
their early afternoon Sunday slot by arriving on stage in dressing gowns, and Mårtennson
managed to get the crowd energised by telling us so often that we ended up
believing that it really was Saturday night at 11pm. Not being restricted by
instrumental duties allowed him the freedom to leap about and around the stage
at will and prove what a fine frontman he is in his own right. A great start to
the Sunday, and a performance that would take a while to be surpassed.
Most
folk who know me claim never to have heard of any of the bands I follow, which
is vaguely depressing, but never mind. They wouldn't have stood a chance with
the next two bands, as even I couldn't claim to know a thing about them before
Sunday (well, Friday, when I read their potted biographies in the programme!). Brighton Rock seemed to me to be very
schizophrenic - great musically, but destroyed by ghastly tuneless, shouty
vocals, which were nigh on impossible to listen to or past. Prophet fared better overall, but
didn't really leave a huge impression once they'd departed the stage. Both
bands did establish a good rapport with the crowd, and the Brighton Rock guys
certainly revealed a solid sense of humour, not least during the only real
moment of 'technical difficulties' I witnessed across the weekend.
My
main Sunday draw card, Alien, were
up next and their hour-long set was worth the price of admission on its own -
and then some. After a couple of disappointing vocalists Jim Jidhed showed how
it’s done, and delivered the performance of the weekend, as far as I’m
concerned. The set was anchored by a stream of classics from their 1988
debut including Go Easy, Tears Don't Put Out the Fire, Jaime Remember and
set-closer Dying By the Golden Rule. To me, they sounded at least twice
as good in a live setting - and about a million times better in the case of
their local (Swedish) mega-hit - the Bee Gees-penned Only One Woman,
which is a lowlight of said debut album (albeit a highly catchy and
memorable one), but became somehow much classier in a live setting. One of
the unexpected highlights was brand new song In Love We Trust – talk about an instant earworm! If the rest of
the forthcoming album is as catchy as that they may manage to top that debut.
I'm
always happy to give bands I don't know a fair hearing, so was quite
prepared to starve in the name of music if what was on offer warranted
it...sadly a few songs into Baton Rouge's
set I suddenly realised I was very hungry indeed...by (almost) all
accounts I left at the right time, as the set, which started fairly badly, only
disintegrated further as lead singer Kelly Keeling's (alleged)
substance-fuelled antics drove both his bandmates and the audience to despair
and calls of 'car-crash' started to flood the Firefest Facebook page. Oh well,
that's rock and roll for ya...
I
returned in time to catch all but the opening track of the set by J-PEG or JLS,
or whatever they're called (Oh sod it, it was Vixen, currently going by their members initials, which are
impossible to remember even whilst looking at them in print, okay?). This
is another group who fall into the 'not really my flavour of ice cream'
category, but they certainly delivered a great show regardless and unlike most
present I was only paying attention to their music and stage presence - as possibly
the only gay in the Firefest village their apparent amazing looks passed me by
entirely.
The final act of the weekend - and another serious
draw for me - was Legends, the group
led by Swedish guitar hero Tommy Denander that features a rotating cast of
classic rock vocalists belting out their best-known hits. The originally
announced line-up for Firefest consisted of Joe Lynn Turner, Eric Martin and
Fergie Frederiksen, but ultimately only Martin made it on the night, with
Fergie sadly missing due to a turn for the worse in his ongoing cancer
battle, and JLT pulling out because...he needed to stay in and catch up on Breaking Bad (or some other entirely
pathetic excuse - doesn't matter, he wasn't missed!). In their places were
Graham Bonnet and Bobby Kimball, so Rainbow and Toto nuggets were both still
prominently featured in the set.
Bonnet
was first to hit the stage and while, unlike some of his contemporaries, he
looks every bit as old as his 66 years (if not older), he proved he
could still deliver the goods and, amid much daft stage banter with the crowd
and Denander, ran through two Rainbow numbers, along with MSGs Desert Song, before handing the
spotlight over to the impossibly baby-faced Eric Martin. Martin saw Bonnet's
banter-level and raised it, resulting in much hilarity (and at least one shout
of 'get on with it') throughout his set of early Mr Big classics, following three
Lean
Into It tracks with Wild World,
for which he brought on a special guest vocalist (No, not Jeff Scott Soto,
amazingly enough) to swell the ranks of legends onstage even further - for it
was none other than Bob smeggin' Catley. If my weekend hadn't already been made
several times over that right there would have done it, especially in what has
been my first Magnum-less year since landing in the UK. Uncle Bob got to plug
the upcoming Magnum album and tour before he and Martin departed and Bobby Kimball
took to the stage. I'll freely admit that Fergie is my favourite Toto
vocalist and I was dying to see him for the first time, but I can't ever
complain about an opportunity to see Bobby, and he was on fine form. Bobby has come
in for some flack online for variable vocal performances in recent years,
but while he is undoubtedly better on some nights than others I've never
encountered a poor performance from him personally. This time he wasn't quite
the very best I've ever seen him, but it was pretty close. My only
complaint about his set was that he really doesn't sing enough of Africa to justify its inclusion (despite
its mega-hit status) and the keyboardist's lead vocal on the verses was only
passable (if only Mr Catley had come back to perform this part!). When it
comes to all things Toto my standards are impossibly high, and to be fair I
haven't seen any other negative reaction to the performance. In any case it was
quickly made up for with brilliant renditions of White Sister and Rosanna
(during which Bobby sang both his own and Luke's part, though this did
highlight why it was split between them in the first place!).
Then
it was encore time, with each vocalist returning for one more number, and in
every case the choice was as obvious as it was obligatory - Rainbow's Since You Been Gone for Bonnet, To Be With You - the song that put me
off Mr Big for two full decades - for Martin (joined again by Bob Catley,
which had the surprising effect of making a song I've always loathed immensely
enjoyable) and Toto's Hold the Line
for Kimball, which proved an entirely suitable climax for the entire three
days. Certainly the set silenced any doubters who had questioned the wisdom of
including a ‘cabaret’ or ‘karaoke’ act as a headliner.
All
that remained was the (presumably traditional) thank you to and from the crew,
and an outpouring of affection to clearly-touched (not like that!) organiser
Kieran Dargen, that was as close as you'll get to the reaction at a Marillion
convention outside of ...erm, a Marillion convention. It was great to be there
for the end of the festival for the first time - we'll have to wait and see
what is unveiled for next year's swansong, but while there are enough faithful regulars
to have seen the VIP packages sell out before any bands have even been
announced, I'll be waiting for the final line-up details before deciding just
how many days I'll be spending in Nottingham this time next year...but you can
pretty much guarantee there'll be something on the bill to entice me!
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