THE DEAD DAISIES LIVEN UP THE SUNSET STRIP

THE DEAD DAISIES LIVEN UP THE SUNSET STRIP
Show review by Bill Rowan, The Dedicated Rocker Society (Photos by: Bill Rowan) 

As I’m cruising over the hill from the Valley, heading out to the Strip, it seemed like another Thursday night in Hollywood. Upon reaching the famous Whisky a Go Go there is a crowd gathering outside as the marquee reads The Dead Daisies. Who are the Dead Daisies you night ask? Well, formed in 2012 across the globe in Australia by a singer from New Zealand and a native Aussie guitar player the band has been a melting pot of musicians from around the world. Now with 3 albums under their belt, the line-up has come to rest upon the band that will be performing tonight.  Along with co-founding Aussie guitarist David Lowy, we have the beast from Jersey on drums Brian Tichy and on bass all the way from San Diego the madman Marco Mendoza. Rounding out the Daisies we have Philly natives John Corabi handling vocals and the flexible fingers of one Doug Aldrich on lead guitar.

 Once inside this historical landmark is when the real magic happens. For a week night with plenty of others things to do in this busy city, it’s packed, hot and sweaty inside as we wait for the arrival of this talented band of musicians. As usual, once you hear the sound system playing the mash up of Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath, then you know they are about to hit the stage.

When I say hit the stage I mean BAM! Here are a couple of covers for you L.A. First up, “Midnight Moses” the Sensational Alex Harvey Band song from the Daisies 2nd LP,  Revolución, going right into the cover of the Cactus classic “Evil”. There’s no doubt about it, these guys came to conquer. Now it’s time to tackle the new record, with the title track “Make Some Noise” and “Long Way To Go”. And I must say, my heart is feeling the presence of drummer Brian Tichy as he pounds his way through the songs only to be matched by his low end brother Marco on bass. 

Did I tell you who opened the show? It was Steve Rodgers and his acoustic guitar. The son of the great singer from Free/Bad Co. Mr. Paul Rodgers. Let’s say he did his dad proud, especially when he ended his set acapella. Now back to the headliners. Was it a coincidence that the band covered his dad’s song “All Right Now” a day after the birthday of Free guitarist Paul Kossoff? Who knows? It sounded great just the same. To my surprise after the latest gem “All The Same” Marco told us that they were recording tonight. This got the packed house a little more pumped up in the heat of the moment. 

Singer John Corabi played acoustic guitar on “Something I Said” while Doug Aldrich broke out the voice box for their cover of the Who classic, “Join Together”  then segued right into a very underrated song which happened to be their first single, “Lock-n-Load”. I thought maybe Slash would come out and play his very recognizable riff that he played on their first record. Instead it was time to hear a drum solo and this was my first time seeing Brian play in a small club. He did not disappoint, he demolished the drums with both his sticks and his hands. This lead into their rousing rendition of the CCR classic “Fortunate Son”. Another first for me was seeing Doug Aldrich play a BC Rich guitar and Doug was on fire the whole night, no matter what guitar he was playing. 

The band continued to rip through the heat of the night on songs like, “The Last Time I Saw The Sun”, “With You and I” and one of my favorites “A Song and A Prayer”. After introducing the band, things got HEAVY, with “Mainline” and their version of “Helter Skelter”. Wow, what an amazing night of hard rock and what a display of top notch musicians having fun on a Thursday.

For an encore the guys continued their onslaught with “Mexico” and from their latest, “We All Fall Down” only to finish out the set with a cover of the Joe South classic, “Hush”. All in all I must say, there will always be a place for Hard Rock, even on the Sunset Strip in 2016. Thanks to David, John, Doug, Brian and Marco from The Dead Daisies and Chip from Chipster PR.
-Bill Rowan, Dedicated Rocker Society