The first day of MRF3 was a nice, mellow way to start the weekend. Most of the acts were doing acoustic sets today, and with a start time of 4PM there weren't many people there yet.
The venue itself is perfect for this type of event. H.O.M.E. Bar (Home Of Music & Entertainment) is actually in a strip mall, in between a dental office and a Bounce Palace kids birthday party store. You walk in and it's a sports bar, with tons of TV's tuned to the games and tables to sit and eat. Go a little further in and you get to the H.O.M.E. Theater, a warehouse type interior with the stage situated in the middle and bars on either side.
The Radio Sun started off the weekend just before 4PM. I didn't know a thing about these guys, but Andrew McNeice brought them up with him from Melbourne, Australia. They played a quick 30 minute set of upbeat melodic pop with nice four part harmonies. Their debut album is currently being recorded with Paul Laine (ex-Danger Danger) producing and should be out early next year. Looking forward to what they'll sound like plugged in tomorrow.
Set List: 1-Julie
2-Don't Judge A Book By It's Cover
3-Let's Talk About Love
4-Summer Girl
5-World's Crazy Now6-Do It Again
7-Ordinary Star
8-Wrong Things RightUp next was
Line Of Fire, a band out of North Carolina that sound a bit like Journey around the Infinity, Evolution, Departure
era. I was surprised to see Brent "Wildman" Enman, who recently put out a very good solo CD, had joined the band, . Stripped down to a 3 piece for this acoustic show, Shawn Pelata's vocals really stood out, and the songs sounded good in this format. "Obsession" from their Momentum album sounded really good acoustic and they did a nice, slowed down version of Dokken's "Breaking The Chains" from the same album. The harmonies on closer "I'll Be The One Tonight" were perfect! Hopefully we get an electric set from them next year, and I'm looking forward to see what they record with Enman in the band.
Set List: 1-Faith In Fire
2-Live & Let Go
3-Paradise
4-Obsession
5-Breaking The Chains
6-Morning Light
7-I'll Be The One Tonight I've been a fan of
Gary Schutt's since his first album Sentimental came out. This guy is such an underrated guitarist, singer and songwriter. He did his "Gary-okee" show at the pre-show get together on Thursday night and was a one man party. Both fans and members of Eclipse, No Love Lost and more got up to sing with him, and if you weren't there you missed a great time.
Gary actually did an electric set, but with just himself and his guitar playing along to pre-recorded tracks. His set went as far back as the Playthings album with "Animal Man" but he mainly stuck to newer songs from the instrumental album Loss 4 Words ("Black Cloud" was especially good) and Contingency Plan. I was hoping for some tracks off the classic Sentimental album, especially with Jeff Scott Soto on the bill, but no such luck. He did play some songs from his upcoming album Moving Parts like the pounding "Million Miles An Hour" and the fun ode to his "Commodore 64" but the title track was really great. He told me later that it's his new favorite song, and it's one of mine too.
All the way from Brazil via New York,
Ferreira also plugged in a did a great set. They were a late addition to the
festival, but a welcome one. Marco was at the past MelodicRockFest's with one of his "other" bands Goodbye Thrill, but this time he brought along his brother Alex on drums, guitarist Gus Monstanto (who came in all the way from Brazil just for this show) and on bass Dario Seixas (who had a smoking hot blond on his arm all weekend).
s D I've got all the Ferreira, Goodbye Thrill and solo stuff that Marco Ferreira has put out, and I wasn't sure what to except from them live, but they did a good mix of songs in this short set including some new songs from their forthcoming album. This guy is so talented, and his smooth vocals and catchy songs went over well. Besides their own material, they threw in a decent cover of Def Leppard's "Armageddon It." Goodbye Thrill's "Rainy Days" was the best of the set, and is still stuck in my head. Marco and his band mates hung around all weekend, watching the bands like the rest of us fans.
Set List: 1-Night To Remember
2-Scumbag
3-Heaven Is Her Name
4-Pay With Pain
5-No Friend Of Mine
6-Armageddon It
7-Rainy Days
8-Let Me Sleep The wild card of the weekend was
Robert Tepper, who kind of faded from the AOR scene since the 90's. In fact it's been 16 years since No Rest For The Wounded Heart came out. Since then he's been doing the singer/songwriter thing and so this acoustic format fit him perfectly.
Of all the "older" artists this weekend, Tepper has changed the most. He hopped on stage wearing a gray sport coat and his long hair is now a closely cropped gray as well, but as soon as he opened his mouth to sing you knew right away it was him.He seemed surprised and genuinely humbled by the reception he got. I'd gather that most people only know him from his hit song "No Easy Way Out" from the Rocky IV soundtrack, but there is so much more to him and there were fans in the audience who knew a lot more than I did. Some were shouting out songs from his past, and he obviously was touched that people were that familiar with him, but after all he was playing to fans of the genre, not in
some bar filled with people who only came to hear one song.
Besides new material from his latest New Life Story and of course songs like "No Easy Way Out" and "Angel of the City", he also played a great acoustic version of "Into the Night", which he co-wrote with Benny Mardones. Jeff Paris also joined him for a blues number. This turned into a really fun show, and I know Robert left knowing that he still has a great fan base out there.
I was a fan of
Glen Burtnik long before he joined Styx, and his 1987 album Heroes And Zeroes is one of my favorite albums of all time. I ran into him in the hotel lobby earlier in the day and asked him (only half jokingly) if he was doing the album in it's entirety. Unfortunately, he said he didn't even remember most of the songs (I hope he was kidding). The set he did do was just about everything you could ask for though.
The second song in was "Follow You" from Heroes and Zeroes. He also did an unreleased song from that very album called "Palm Of My Hand," plus the classic "Little Red House" and the title track from "Talking In Code." Of course he was going to do some Styx stuff, and he did “Edge Of The Century” closed with “Kiss Your Ass Goodbye,” and a version of the little known “All In A Day’s Work” was a great surprise.Talking to him after the show, he was also
planning on doing "Love Is The Ritual" but it didn't work out. It was too bad that Robin Beck wasn't here this weekend. Not only did she cover "Follow You" on her latest album, she would've been great dueting on "Sometimes Love Just Ain't Enough."
Glen's song choices were perfect for this acoustic setting, his voice was strong and at times he closed his eyes and seemed to disappear into the music. The highlight of his set was definitely "Perfect World," and I was able to tell him after the show how much this song meant to me personally.
Set List 1-All That's Yet To Come
2-Follow You
3-Little Red House
4-Palm Of My Hand
5-Crank It Up
6-Talking In Code
7-Edge Of The Century
8-Perfect World
9-All In A Day's Work
10-Bam!
11-Sometimes Love Just Ain't Enough
12-Kiss Your Ass Goodbye
Kelly Keeling came to our attention with his band Baton Rouge, and has become one of the go-to vocalists in the AOR/Hard Rock scene,and lately he's been touring and recording with Tran-Siberian Orchestra. Unfortunately, his set tonight was a disjointed mess. It appeared he wrote his set list on scrap paper which he was fumbling around with most of the show, and after the 3rd song started asking for requests. When someone shouted out "Vampire Kiss" he said he doesn't do any of Jack's (Ponti) songs anymore, so obviously there was some falling out. He also didn't know the words to some of his own songs, but we helped him remember them.
Alternating between acoustic guitar and keyboards, he did great versions of "Walks Like A Woman," "There Was A Time" and "Melenie" plus a song from Trans-Siberian Orchestra's Night Castle album. When he was on, he was on. He also mentioned that Baton Rouge will be recording a live album soon for release early next year, so that's
something to look forward to.
I asked
Eric Martin after his show if he had a picture of Dorian Grey in his attic. This guy just does not age, and still looks like he's in his 20's, even up close. He sounded as good as ever, even though he was fighting a bad cold. In Mr. Big, he plays with some of the best musicians in the business, but he proved he's as talented by himself with just an acoustic guitar and his voice. With the guys in Mr. Big doing their own things right now, including the great Winery Dogs, he has time to so some solo shows of his own.
The set-list was mostly Mr. Big songs, but he did fit in one solo song. During his version of Mr. Big's version of Cat Stevens' "Wild World," he was joined on stage by Jeff Scott Soto, Glen Burtnik, Kelly Keeling, David Reece and Joe Retta, who were immediately dubbed the "Jeff Scott Soto Singers." Most were back up there again along with Erik Martensson for "To Be With You" and Glen Burtnik even got behind the drums. Highlight of the show for me at least was a great version of "Voodoo Kiss." Martin pretty much drew the biggest crowd of the day also.
Set List: 1-Where Do I Fit In
2-Kansas
3-Goin' Where The Wind Blows
4-Wild World
5-Voodoo Kiss
6-Shine
7-Electrified8-Water Over The Bridge
9-To Be With You
10-Don't Stop
11-Crossroads The final show of the night was an electric set from
Bonrud out of Minnesota. Singer Rick Forsgen wasn't able to make it due to the recent death of his father, so a guy named Sean Smith filled in and did an admirable job learning all these songs at the last minute.They also switched drummers about halfway through the set for a reason I didn't catch.
They opened with the heavy riffs of "Bullet In The Back" from the latest album Save Tomorrow. In fact they did the entire album except for "I'd Do Anything" and nothing from their debut at all, but it didn't really matter. The new stuff is heavier, but still melodic and sounded really good live. "Torn Apart" and the title track have great, catchy chorus's while "Liquid Sun" had a little more "modern rock" vibe to it. Closing song "We Collide" was one of the best they did all night and a great way to end Day 1.
Set List: 1-Bullet In The Back
2-Torn Apart
3-Blinded
4-You're The One
5-Liquid Sun
6-Dominoes
7-Last Sunrise
8-Save Tomorrow
9-American Dream
10-End Of Days
11-We Collide
Lun 21 Oct - 16:20
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