“When trying to figure out the last time I saw an artist leave it all on the stage the way Suede’s Brett Anderson did in Toronto, I’m coming up with a pretty short list of names. Anderson was a jumping, gyrating, animated, sweaty, quivering mess after 15 songs. Two songs into Suede’s set, he was…
Category: Event Reviews
Cancer Bats and Comeback Kid bring the aggression on a Thursday Night at Maxwell’s in Waterloo [Photos]
After a quick changeover, The Cancer Bats took the stage with the title track from their recently released “Psychic Jailbreak.” Liam Cormier, Mike Peters, and Jaye Schwarzer were joined this evening by Like a Motorcycle guitarist KT Lamond. Lamond, filling the space left open by the departure of Scott Middleton last year, sounded right in…
Muse triumphantly returns to Toronto, playing to an exuberant crowd at History in Toronto [Photos]
Matt Bellamy, Dominic Howard, and Chris Wolstenholme took the History stage at 9:00 pm to a hail of cheers and applause from the audience. They performed this evening on a truncated stage set up that surrounded them on both sides and behind them with floor-to-ceiling lighting. Dominic was atop a three-foot steel riser at centre…
Sleigh Bells (w/ N3ptune, Black Dresses) Simply Slay at Toronto’s Velvet Underground [Photos]
Alexis Krauss and Derek Miller took the stage with a keyboardist/vocalist and live drummer for this performance, launching into “Justine Go Genesis” to spearhead their set. The audience went nuts. Krauss had to stop their performance after a few songs to check on some girls in the front row who got visibly bounced around during…
Primus (w/ Black Mountain) Bring Rush Back to Canada at Massey Hall in Toronto! [Photos]
“Are they here? Are they in the venue?”These words were on the lips of everyone in front of Massey Hall before this performance – fans hoping for a glimpse of Alex Lifeson and/or Geddy Lee on this first night of two special performances of Rush’s seminal A Farewell to Kings album. It was hard to…
Opeth, Mastodon and Khemmis Lay Waste to Toronto’s Queen Elizabeth Theatre [Photos]
Opeth is still cresting high on the wave of their most excellent 2019 album, In Cauda Venenum. They only performed Heart In Hand (Hjärtat vet vad handen gör) from the new album. This saddened me as the new album is so good that I would have been satisfied if they played the entire thing. Instead,…
Mammoth WVH & Dirty Honey Keep it Real at Toronto’s Danforth Music Hall [Photos]
Mammoth WVH similarly took the stage and delivered another round of in-your-face rock ’n roll. Seeing Wolfgang Van Halen on stage with Jon Jourdan (guitar), Ronnie Ficarro (bass), and Garrett Whitlock (drums) gives me renewed hope that rock bands are NOT a thing of the past at all. Mammoth WVH performed most of the debut…
Tool (w/ The Acid Helps) Topple Buffalo’s KeyBank Center [Show Review]
Maynard strutted from adjacent risers to either side of Danny Carey, adorned with his “spikey hair” and make-up around his face (making him look a bit like James O’Barr’s Crow character. Updated hypnotic visuals featuring weird fractals, undisclosed slippery ‘meaty’ organisms, and chattering mouths with infinitely long tongues (along with a battery of lasers and…
Mike Bax 