Matt Van Stone

Read the rest of this entry »

Yesterday was a crazy day. First I got to meet Zakk Wylde, in the flesh, then his show at MacEwan Ballroom kicked ass.

We went to the show late. It opened at 7pm, but we showed up at about 8:30. The opening band sucked so we looked at the merch and the people for a while.

Once it seemed like the opening band was done and the setup for BLS was done we moved back into the hall. However, it was still about a half hour wait after some guy came on the mic and said “BLS Will be taking the stage in a few moments!”. They kept playing music that made you think they were coming out, but they weren’t. When the siren started going, we knew what was up.

They had a huge BLS flag covering the whole stage and when the siren and red light started going we could see flashes of Zakk’s shadow against the flag. It was pretty dramatic. Finally the song starts and the flag drops to the stage. It was wicked. I cant remember the exact songs that he played in the set. The highlight for me was probably The Beginning at Last since his first album Sonic Brew is my favorite. The sound setup was awesome at this show. When I saw him in Vancouver the sound really stunk. You could basically just hear bass and drums and every once and a while you could hear his singing or some guitar. This time was totally different though, all of the instruments were really clear and you could hear singing and solos and everything.

The acoustic set was good, but I like the old Zakk “machine gun man” Wylde. When he started playing MGM I was pretty excited, but he didn’t end up playing anything but the rhythm and he only played it for a bit. I would have loved to hear that song live. Zakk’s piano set was pretty cool. He didn’t do anything like that in Vancouver when I saw him in ’05. In fact, he seemed really happy to be there and seemed to he having a great time on stage. In Vancouver he just played and that was it. At this show he was joking around and dancing around the stage making fun of Dancing with the Stars. It was awesome. I really hope that he enjoyed playing here enough that he will come back next time he is on tour. BLS is still somewhat unknown as a band. They have a pretty big cult following though and pretty much anyone who has seriously played guitar knows that he is one of the greatest players to ever live.

There was no encore, but he did play a 2+ hour set and I was really happy with it. I got a bunch of good pictures that I have uploaded to my flickr account and I got a few videos too. The one video is awesome, but since I was so close to the stage the sound is messed. I’m gonna see if I can clean it up a bit and then upload it to YouTube if it is acceptable.

Again, it was a really wicked show, I probably would have paid five times as much to see him and it has renewed my obsession with him and his music. SDMF Bleed Black Label.

Here is a link to the flickr set of photos from the concert.

I want to do this while it is still fresh in my mind…

I arrived at Guitar Works at 11:30. I was a bit early but I was about the 20th person there. They started handing out entry wrist straps at 12pm. If you brought your Shot to Hell CD with you they gave you a wrist strap. Then they started another line for people who did not bring a CD. I did not bring a CD because I assumed they would be readily available. So I waited with a group of about 25 people who needed to buy a CD. 1pm rolled around and still no Zakk, 2pm – no Zakk and still no CDs. At about 2:30 we see Zakk walk by the window. A guy comes out and starts handing out small posters for Zakk’s new deal with Dunlop for guitar strings. Apparently the CDs got lost somewhere or weren’t brought to the store or something. No big deal, I didn’t really care that much about the signature.

The shitty thing was I was maybe 5th in line to buy a CD, but when they started giving out the posters they just sort of started from the middle. By the time it was all done I ended up near the very end of the line. I was probably the 10th last person. I was a little choked. I had been standing there for 3 hours already and now I’m behind people who showed up an hour after I did.

By 3:30 I was 3rd or 4th and Zakk just gets up and walks out. I started to sweat a little bit… Where is he going? Then I overhear someone say he had to take a leak – ok, thats fine. Finally I get up to the front, he’s standing in the corner behind a round table. I walk over, put my poster down and he shook my hand and gave me a one armed hug. He asked me what my name was and I told him. He said right on brother or something like that. He asked me if I was coming out to the show tonight and I said yes. I told him it was my second BLS show and that I saw him in Vancouver two years before. He smiled and said right on again. He took a swig of what looked like his 4th Becks and signed and dated my poster. He gave me another huge one-armed hug and said thanks for coming and I’ll see you at the show tonight. For some reason the only thing I could think of to say was “you’re fuckin’ awesome man”, and that was it. The whole thing lasted maybe just over a minute. It was pretty much the single greatest moment ever.

Read the rest of this entry »

Holy freaking God man. Let me give you a recap of the events that took place on Friday. Drove past Guitar Works on 16th Ave (Calgary) at about 11:30pm. Sign says “Meet Zakk Wylde April 12th, see guitarworksonline.com for details!”. I crap my pants. Get home, find out you have to buy a Marshall amp to be guaranteed a spot or enter a draw to possibly win. I drive in next morning at 9:30 and buy the cheapest amp I could. Now I’m going to meet Zakk Wylde at 1pm on Thursday before the concert that night at Mac Hall.

I can not even believe how crazy this is. This is like psycho screaming girls crying because Nick Carter touched them crazy. I’m trying not to think too much about it because I don’t want to be too disappointed when all that happens is he grunts hello and signs an 8×10 glossy for me as quickly as possible to keep the line running. I don’t know what to expect. I have this dream of standing in line as he shreds on some Bullseye Zakk Wylde Signature Gibson 10 or 15 feet away from me while he waits for the 1pm mark so he can start his signing session. Oops… did I say I was trying not to think about it? I know, its a far fetched dream, but I cant help myself.

Anyway, like 70 hours to go.

Here is the PDF advertising it: Meet Zakk Wylde at Guitar Works

Read the rest of this entry »

I got my hands on a copy of Fiction, Dark Tranquillity’s new album to be released April 23rd in Europe. (Don’t know the North American release date, probably the same)

It is all standard Dark Tranquillity. Mikael’s singing is clearly wicked. You get exactly what you would expect from him. I have listened to the album a few times now and in general I am a little disappointed. I have yet to find any of their songs to be very original. To be honest it sort of sounds like Character… but it’s like these are all the songs that didn’t make the cut.

The first single, Focus Shift, is probably the best song on the album, but still I expected more from this. The album just doesn’t have that over the top dramatic feel of Character and Damage Done. I am going to continue to give it a chance, it wouldn’t be the first time I didn’t like an album right away, but I just wanted more out of the box I guess.

If you can’t “find” the album like I did, look after the jump for the music video for Focus Shift.

Read the rest of this entry »

A dream of mine has come true. I got to see Eric Clapton live at the Saddledome on March 26th. It was awesome.

The concert was really good. I enjoyed it thoroughly. We weren’t as close as I originally thought. I thought we were in section 3, row 6, seat 7-10, but they had the stadium setup differently then the diagram showed on ticket master when we got the tickets, so we were actually in row 36. It would have been nicer to be in the lowest tier instead of floor because you wouldn’t have to try to look over the people in front of you, but still, they were really good seats.

The show was probably the best concert I have ever been to. The opening act, Robert Cray was really good. He is some old blues guy. It was awesome though because he didn’t play for very long, just 30 minutes or so. Then they setup for Clapton and he came right out. Clapton played until 10, then walked off. The crowd cheered for 5 minutes solid and they came back out and did 3 more songs. The sound was amazing. It was like watching a concert DVD in person. You always assume that they do all this post processing on the sound on those music DVDs, but really they wouldn’t need to if they regularly play as good as they did last night. Everything was in tune and the sound setup was great. You could hear all of the instruments and everything. Not like some of the metal shows I have been to where all you can hear is the vocals and the drums and then a barrage of guitar and bass noise. It was crystal clear.

The only thing I would change was I would have liked it if Clapton talked a bit more. He basically just came out, played, and left. He said a few words in between a few songs and introduced his band but that was it. It would have been nice to hear him talk for a minute or two.

Read the rest of this entry »

Yes, I was very disappointed about missing Dark Tranquillity last month as you can see in my previous post. However, I did somewhat make up for it by catching Arch Enemy at MacEwan Hall on Saturday.

When I first heard Arch Enemy two or so years ago I wasn’t really into it. The singing was just too heavy for me. Since then I have learned to enjoy a good scream and growl vocalist (Children of Bodom, Dark Tanquillity, Darkest Hour, Himsa, Norther, etc) and when I found out they were coming to town I gave them another go. Man, I have been missing out the vocals are amazing and the guitars are just as technical as anything else I listen to.

First off, unlike pretty much every Metal band ever, Arch Enemy has a female vocalist. She has the chops to pull it off though as you will see in the video I have posted below. All I have to say was the show was freakin awesome. All I ask is that family members who may be reading this brace yourself before watching, this isn’t Ozzy or Metallica “metal”.

I warned you.

Yeah, so I find out tonight that Dark Tanquillity played MacEwan Hall in Calgary on the 9th and I missed them. They are pretty much my favorite band right now and seeing them would have been sweet. It would have been the best show ever (second only to seeing Black Label Society in Vancouver last May).

Last time I checked all of their dates were European, so this must have come up not too long ago.

http://www.dark-tranquillity.nl/upcoming_performances.htm

The lead singer speaks in this rad medieval tone and pronounces all of his words perfectly. I can just hear him now… “How are you all doing tonightaahh? We are Dark Tranquillity from Sweden and this song is called Monochromatic Stainssszzzzzzaaahh”

All I have to say is today is a sad sad day not to be forgotten for at least 6 or 7 fortnights….