Page 36 - RYAN'S GIG GUIDE OCTOBER 2014

RGG October 2014 - p.36
The support band Winston’s Big Brother performed a solid set of Blues based
Rock in the vein of Stevie Ray Vaughan peppered with an occasional dusting
of Oasis inspired song structure A rather fine cover of The Beatles “Come To
gether” was an unexpected high point of their set
The Doors Alive swaggered into view with “When The Music’s Over” An
unexpected opener it might be but an impeccable rendition none the less
immediately helping to thaw the uninitiated to The Doors Alive experience
Not happy to just play the hits and take it easy they seamlessly entwined
“Horse Latitudes” into the closing section of “Moonlight Drive” helping to
make it one of the highpoints of evening A raucous “Roadhouse Blues”
allowed for a nice call and response with the crowd in the shape of ‘Woke up
this morning’ ‘and got my self a beer!’ From the explosive “ To ” to the epic
“Break On Through” the impressive renditions just kept on coming With no
fancy lightshow to bedazzle it was left to the band’s command of The Doors
music to fill the air with magic An emotive “Hyacinth House” allowed the
audience a moment of reflection from the maelstrom of Hard Rock Oh and
a cheeky light hearted “Alabama Song” helped to round out their set
The dictionary definition of ‘tribute’ is: an act statement or gift that is
intended to show gratitude respect or admiration; something resulting from
and indicating the worth of something else At no point during The Doors
Alive show did it feel like a moneymaking rip off it was a true tribute from
the heart which honoured the music and legend of The Doors With wild
staring eyes smiles and singing a number of Doors fans at this gig almost
danced themselves to the point of collapse as the music took hold of them
Despite the set being geared towards the more Hard Rock and Blues elements
of The Doors there was enough variety and top musicianship to suggest The
Doors Alive are more than capable of pulling off the more laid back trippy
nuanced moments of The Doors at future shows Evidence of this deft
subtlety was to be had during the instrumental section of “Light My Fire” and
throughout “L A Women” Fittingly closing out the show with “The End”
which was delivered with an angry apocalyptic grace it left everyone with
satisfied thoughts as they disappeared into the night to reminisce about the
trip they had just been on
For a generation starved of the wild Dionysian spectacle of Jim Morrison &
The Doors The Doors Alive allowed in some small way to relive an echo of
this to once again invigorate the senses A testament to the quality of The
Doors Alive is in trying to recall what songs were played memories of live
recordings by the actual Doors infect the consciousness and fool one into
thinking they had played for over three hours Then you realise something
no they didn’t it was just the fact this band is that good the original and the
tribute blur The Doors Alive deliver deliciously accurate versions of the Doors
music yet they are still full of warmth and spontaneity that even Doors
aficionados are able to forget they are only witnessing a covers band a
magical fun experience devoid of cynicism ‘we want the Doors!’ was the cry
and we want them alive! / Zak rggsince 1995