London, England - Fan Reviews

Fan Review - Destroying London Town By Darren

Not quite up there with Islington but another great show in London. Starting off again with the ultra cool video intro. Followed by a great version of Rocket with the whole crowd singing as one. It wasn't quite the same as the two shows in 2003 at Brixton or Hammersmith (you had to have been there...) but much better reaction than 1999.

Joe - "Alright London - Welcome To The Sparkle Lounge!". C'mon C'mon next and again sounding great. Good to watch the screens up close - thanks to all the Whitesnake fans for leaving!. Watched C'mon C'mon more closely this time to see the Sparkle Lounge cover faces move across the screen. Moving on various forms of transport intercut with images of the band in Union Jack outfits and shots of Sheffield City Centre (Town Hall/Cathedral). Mutt Lange is also shown along with the angel image of Steve Clark. Very cool. I hope any Steve fans in attendance managed to get a shot of that - :)

Animal next and once again fun to see the video images and the band morphing into - Animals. Joe's first speech next.

Joe - "Good evening London! How ya doin'? Thanks for coming - thanks for being here. And thanks for having us because it's a pleasure to be here as always. This is kind of like the last night of the British tour. Because even though there's three shows in a few weeks time, this is the last one with the full production. So it's a big privilege for us to be finishing it in the capital city - of our home country! Make some noise for Black Stone Cherry who've been opening these shows. And of course for Whitesnake as well who've been doing this thing with us. We're also very happy to be here because we have a new album out called Songs From The Sparkle Lounge. We're gonna play you the first track that we put out as a single this one's called - hang on, wait a minute, it is his home town, right. Almost forgot, make some noise for the boy from Walthamstow who is gonna introduce this one. Mr Phil Collen! this one's called Nine Lives!"

Another great version sounding far superior to the studio one. Almost makes you wish for a full live album (rather than just one, or two tracks on a 12"!). MLLAM up next - sang it again. Further proof not many people know anything past the singles but still it sounds better than it has in a while. Maybe due to singing more with Man Raze, Phil's vocal part sounds clearer and stronger than before at these recent shows. Joe gets a little too close to him as he sings it though - quite worrying!...

When Love & Hate Collide next and as with Sheffield I was really impressed with the lighting/video. They had to eventually find a good use for the crap alternate version of the video and now they have (apologies to the woman in the video). Another excellent solo by Phil on this track. As noted elsewhere Joe's voice was in great shape during the song. Joe got us to try the ending one more time so we could be the loudest of the tour. We'll overlook the fact he never said if we were or not.

Sav went right into his bass solo after this with no introduction. Maybe trying to avoid the show going over 11pm as it had in Sheffield. Whitesnake's show was shorter tonight without the band introductions. Another great version of Rock On but standing up for so long was starting to get to me a bit by now. If only they'd find a way of starting their shows earlier - before 9pm at least.

Joe - "You come to London and you start thinking about when you first started out as a band, taking Phil out of this equation cause he wasn't in the band when we first started out...but we used to dream about coming to London, in fact Geoff Barton who I believe may be in the audience tonight. I wrote letters to that bastard every fucking week! for months and months to try and get him up the M1 to see us play a workingmen's club in Sheffield. And you know what god bless him eventually he actually came and him and Ross Halfin, the legendary Ross Halfin who's not dead, as rumour would have it, came and got completely pissed on whiskeys and beers and he gave us a great review in Sounds.

And it all became part of the thing that got us our record deal. The he fucking went and slagged us off on the High 'n' Dry album but Geoff wherever you are we really do still love you. But here we are 30 years later, 30 - years - later! Here we are with a venue full of people, playing rock and roll music and I don't really see anything wrong with this. And we thank you for being here and sharing it with us. Now of course me being the singer I get given a guitar that's completely out of tune! But I can tune it myself, cause I'm better than our fucking road crew."

TSB next up and yes we all sang along again. Followed up with BOTH - once more a great electric ending. But still Switch 625 could have been added in. Straight into Hysteria and then Armageddon It and the big hits ending. Still great despite my tiredness.

Phil used his Ibanez Destroyer guitar during last song 'Rock Of Ages' for the first time since the 1986 tour. Looked great to see that guitar used again. Didn't realise until the song kicked in that he was using it. Probably due to it being mentioned on US radio a couple of months ago by a DJ. Could well be the actual guitar used to record most of the solos on Pyromania and seen in the 1983 videos.

Quick 2min pause and they are back again.

Bad Actress was extended at the start by a minute or so with Joe going into an 'OH YEAH!' chant. Longer than Sheffield anyway. I found it a bit hard to enjoy the last part of the set though due to having stood up for so long - must be (starting to) get old!. But not as old as most of the crowd at these two shows which were mostly late 30s or over. So much for attracting a new young crowd - they must be all at home trying to find the scissors (or playing with knifes) and listening to My Chemical Romance... Joe quote "Hey London! once again been a pleasure as always, always will be. 30 years and we ain't finished yet. as long as there's still people out there we will keep coming back, over and over and over again!. Yeah? I said YEAH!...." etc

Let's Get Rocked to end. And 2008's two day tour (for some) is over.

As good as it was to see the big show again I'd still prefer a proper headline show with a full length set. Or just another show like Islington will do. Note - no, those speeches were not written from memory!.

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Fan Review - Whitesnake & Def Leppard Live By Marty Dodge

First thing that struck about the gig, besides the fact that the opening band were just lame - as one wag put it, "They need a bit more practice methinks" - was the sheer enthusiasm of the crowd. This was a bit of a co-headline tour of the UK. Although Def Leppard have a bigger set; it was clear to all that Whitesnake were there equals. Tonight saw the end of their full "Songs from the Sparkle Lounge" set with the videos and the whole nine yards. They head off with Whitesnake and Thunder for a few more dates in July. That will be a pretty awesome night of bluesy rock. Every single song was a sing-along; it was that sort of night.

Jimmy Page and Ritchie Sambora were in attendance for this gig and so were quite a few other industry types (inc. ole Cov's wife and daughter). It was quite a show. What first struck those of us who are veterans of London-based gigging was the fact that London Arena has been completely revamped. It stuck us that the new competition from the O2 and it several venues has forced them to up their game. The sound is excellent and the facilities are what you would expect from a major venue these days; even clean toilets and cleaners constantly making the rounds.

Then after quite a quick change-over came Def Leppard in full voice. We were treated to quite an amusing retrospect of their entire career warts and all. Joe Elliot has upped his game having to follow David Coverdale. He was the consummate showman; playing to the crowd. He made sure to let us know that this was no farewell tour. As with Whitesnake it was a good mixture of songs from their latest album and their myriad of hits. The only one that was notably absent was "Love Bites". It was Def Lep. returned to their prime; with the lads delivering every ounce they could. Overall Def Lep probably gave a better performance by a smidgen.

The near sell-out crowd were treated to hard rock at its barn-storming best. Considering people had travelled from the North of England (our hotel was packed with ageing rockers) it was a damn good thing. The standing audience were a whole new generation of blues-rock fans while the more demure contented themselves with the seated area.

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Fan Review - DEF LEPPARD By Chinners

After nearly three hours of bands, I felt quite drained, however after the lights of the arena dimmed once again I felt a surge of energy as Def Leppard hit the stage. three huge video screens light up, with the two outside screens showing live footage of the band and the centre screen showing the English Union Jack flag and playing the British national anthem, images of Def Leppard throughout the years from 1979 to 2008 stating "That was Then This is Now". The band then took to the stage, Joe Elliott called out "Guitar", "Drums" and launched in to "Rocket" with live images and animation on the rear screen of rockets flying through the air. All around you could hear the excited crowd singing along, this was just an amazing entrance.

Promoting their new album "Songs From the Sparkle Lounge" the band performed newer songs "C'mon C'mon" and "Nine Lives" early on in the set with the rest of the set mainly made up of classics, which was just what the audience wanted. Rick Savage appeared high up on one of the platforms and proceeded to perform a bass solo with the band arriving to perform a cover of David Essex's "Rock On" taken from their covers album "Yeah" . The whole band arrived at the front of the stage with acoustic guitars and performed a couple of stripped down tracks "Two steps Behind" and "Bring' on the heartbreak" both fully accompanied by the crowd who seemed to be word perfect.

The night continued with the anthems "Hysteria", Armageddon it" and "Pour some Sugar on Me" which all were accompanied with further video and live footage creating some amazingly awesome effects. Another track from the new album "Bad Actress" and "Lets Get Rocked" ended the nights proceedings with the whole of the crowd on their feet with their arms in the air. The band all then came to the end of the middle walkway to thank the crowd and take their final bows, once again the crowd showed their appreciation. As everyone filtered out of the arena into the wet London evening, I can't imagine that anyone has gone home less than totally satisfied with the evenings entertainment.

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