Was anyone else at Tremont in North Carolina Saturday night besides me?

[Rocksister]

Got there right at 8:00 and the first band was announcing its last song. Either they started early or they only did two songs, I'm not sure which. Anyway, I didn't get to hear much of the band (Merwyn?); didn't even catch their name, as I was busy getting tickets and drinks. We heard Shock Opera (two words or one?), Blackguard, and Powerglove before "THE band" came on stage. I'm only expressing an opinion here, so don't bite my head off, no professional review or anything, okay? I'm a music snob; I like Symphony X and in all honesty, everything else is not even good enough to be second rate next to them. I do NOT like screaming, growly death metal and the like. HOWEVER, I really enjoyed Blackguard, and no one was more shocked than my own self. I could not listen to their CD's, no way, but LIVE, they ROCK!!! The fact that they had a female drummer was intriguing, and she kicked BUTT, I tell you! The hair slinging was way cool, even though it gave me a headache just to watch them. Ha. I also thought Shock Opera was AWESOME, and I'd consider buying a CD from them. They covered "Wayward Son," and I think I was the only person there old enough to sing along. Ha, loved it! They were really great. Since I am too old to have grown up in the video game era, I wasn't much of a fan of Powerglove. No insult intended, it's just way outside my normal listening range. The costumes kinda were over the top, just my opinion. But what took my potential for enjoyment away for good was their encouragement to the audience to scream out profanities. Hey, I'm not a goody two shoes or anything, but 99% of the audience was younger than 25. Lots of them were under 21. I was there with my son, who was 24, and he hated that, too. "Profanity equals covering up for lack of talent." I tend to agree. My son plays lead guitar in a metal band, by the way. So when I see Powerglove on the playbill, I'll take an extended potty break. With earplugs. The familiar lead-in track to Paradise Lost came up on the sound system, the lights went off, and we knew what we had been waiting for finally was coming. And the guys rocked just like every other time I have seen them live. Hot, muggy, miserable....they rocked harder than EVER, all of them soaked and dripping with sweat, none of them complaining, all of them having the time of their lives. Man, those guys are just freakin' WICKED on stage! The interaction between them is fabulous. You can tell they are friends off stage as well. The two bands that bailed on SX at the last minute, after months of practice and scheduling work, got a tongue lashing by Russell, which they deserved . But hopefully all will work out for those guys, too. After the set which included the released singles from the new CD, the audience, just like every other time I've been to an SX concert, started screaming "Odyssey." But an audience member became overwhelmed by the heat. The band stopped the show, went over to take care of the stricken lady, then came back on stage to announce they would not begin their encore until the lady was taken care of by EMS. See, this is a class act. THIS is what makes me respect a band. NOT jumping up and screaming profanities every fourth word, and flipping off the audience, and grabbing their junk. They actually cared enough about that ONE audience member enough to ask the rest of us to be patient, and we all were in total agreement. Besides, it made Russell come out to get a beer and we got to see him and get some pics. LOL Hopefully the lady is okay; I guess I'll never hear about it. But the guys in SX are a class act, and that is one concert that everyone will remember, just for that occurrence, them showing how cool and caring they are. The stage was backlit, out toward the audience, so I got zero good pics, but man, they did Odyssey for the encore and they played every bit of it LIVE and we were STOKED!!! So awesome. I congratulate them on a fabulous show (they can't do any other kind, ya know) and I'm looking forward to seeing them again soon. But someone please tell them not to come back to the southeastern United States until cool weather. Holy crap, it DO get hot down here.............If anyone was at Tremont and got some decent pix, I'd love to see them. I got a tee shirt, a GIRL tee shirt, after all my whining, and it fits and looks GREAT with the Iconoclast mask logo on it. Waiting patiently for June 21..........

 

[Phanto]

Paragraphs please I managed a few lines before I gave up. Sounds like you had a good time though

 

[nckissfan]

I was there. had a good time. The opening bands were not that good, though. Blackguard was pretty good, but Powerglove is so cheesy, I could not take them seriously, even though I can see they are talented. I cannot agree with you that the two bands that bailed deserved the tongue lashing. What is Nevermore to do, with two members deciding to quit the band? Are they supposed to get two temporary guys to fill in, just to run a tour? If it wasn't for Nevermore and Soilwork dropping off the tour, you would not have heard The Odyssey live.

 

[Detective Clarence Beauregard]

When I saw the show in Chicago, I couldn't stand Blackguard. They sounded like typical screaming metal with no melody. However, the sound at that show wasn't particularly good, so when I caught the show in LA I actually liked their music. I was on the balcony, and could thus hear the keyboard (I didn't even know they had keyboard in Chicago; couldn't hear it). There wasn't a keyboard player, but it was obvious that the drummer (who I agree with Rocksister was very good) was playing to a metronome or something to keep in time with the keyboard track. Anyway, the keyboard lines were very medieval and interesting, and made the rest of the music much more listenable. I would listen to this band if they got an actual singer! For this reason I think they were not a good fit for this tour, since in my experience few who come to see Symphony X want to hear someone screaming.

I can completely understand why some people may dislike Powerglove, but growing up with some of the classic video games they played tunes from (Mario, Mortal Kombat, Mega Man, etc) I have to say that I found them highly entertaining. They were a bit goofy, and the costumes certainly were over-the-top (especially the drummer's, haha), but that's what they were going for. I found it amusing that they started passing out inflatable swords and hammers for the "mosh pit," as it kept things interesting and different. As for the profanities, it may have been a bit excessive, but they were just trying to get the crowd into it. And trust me, those guys do have musical talent; the video game music of the day was written on computers and programmed into the games, thus very difficult to play on actual instruments like guitars and bass (look up some tunes from the Mega Man games if you don't believe me). Personally I think it's cool that Symphony X toured with a band that doesn't take themselves seriously, as opposed to "just another metal band" (which is how I view bands like Nevermore and Soilwork).

Anyway, as for Symphony X, I too think it's awesome that they halted the show until that lady got medical attention. Very classy indeed. I can't wait until these guys come back for a full-on Iconoclast tour!

 

[Chainrider]

When I saw them in Hollywood, Russell didn't tongue lash them at all, and in fact went out of his way to wish them the best. He also seemed pretty excited to be able to use the time to play The Odyssey.

 

[RammsteinSkins]

Yeah, that was very classy of the band. The elderly woman was actually the mother of one of the Shockopera guys. I was in the third row for all of the songs except for The Odyssey and it was a great show, got a picture with Jason.

 

[nckissfan]

I grew up with all those video games, when I was younger, but I still found Powerglove to be really dumb. Seriously, after five minutes, I wished for a power outage or something. They are wasting their talent.

Blackguard used to have a girl keyboardist, but for some reason she couldn't continue with the band, so they have been using that keyboard taped stuff. I went to the show in Raleigh, as well as the Charlotte show. They sounded much better in Charlotte. Probably the size of the room helped that.

 

[ShockOperaBassWife]

Just wanted to follow up with a few answers and opinions. I am Ronnie Eury's wife, he is the bass player in ShockOpera.

The show actually started at 7:30, on the dot no less, and the first band was a bunch of very nice young guys named Merzah.

ShockOpera played number 2 in line, unfortunately without a sound check due to time crunch. I hung back because of that sound problem, they sounded much better from back and center.

You were not the only one to rock out to "Carry On". That is my era as well. I saw a lot of fans singing and enjoying that one. Your kind words about ShockOpera are very much appreciated by the way. ShockOpera is dedicated to fans and every one of them count. Their popularity is growing and I am sure they will be every bit as known as the big boys.

The little lady that was taken to the hospital? That was my mother-in-law. That woman has never missed a show since her 2 boys have picked up an instrument. She is 77 years old and this incident certainly won't stop her. We will make sure, however, that she has plenty of liquids and a fan at her side in the future. Ronnie Eury (bass player) and Brian Eury (Keyboards) are her 2 sons. She is so extremely proud of her boys.

As far as Russel Allen is concerned! I cannot say enough about this man. He escorted the stretcher all the way to the ambulance to make sure Mom was ok before feeling comfortable enough to continue their show. Myself and several other ShockOpera members and wives couldn't thank him and the rest of Symphony X enough for being so kind, considerate and respectful.

This is a band that far exceeds the expectation's of even the harshest of critic's. They are a group of upstanding men that bands like ShockOpera will model themselves after. Hats off to them!