Event Reviews

As we have been consistently documenting over the past 12 months, it’s been a helluva year for the Norn Iron rock and metal scene – and especially for the two bands tasked with hosting this end-of-term party (Stormzone released their fourth, and most acclaimed and successful, album to date while …

Tonight’s support was The Wild Lies who got the night off to a good start.  When a support band is faced with a fairly empty venue when they go on stage it must be quite demoralising, and I’ve seen some bands in that situation putting in pretty underwhelming performances whereas …

Grand Central is a rock/metal pub in Manchester which joins forces with Rocksector records to host live bands every Thursday. When bands are on, the pool tables are pushed to one side and a small stage area is created to the far left hand side of the pub (as you walk in). With …

Tonight Heavens Basement and The Smoking Hearts were at Wulfrun Hall in Wolverhampton supporting Black Veil Brides.  With a crowd consisting of 99% teenage girls and given how dedicated BVB fans are to their band I was wondering how the support acts would fare.  The venue was packed out well …

There are many things to do just before the holiday season starts. My “to-do” list started with the Combichrist show in The Classic Grand on 22nd December. Although when I got there I realised I wasn’t the only one with the same idea. It was only a few minutes past …

They just love the UK, don’t they Airbourne? Two UK festivals in Download and Hard Rock Hell this year and now a full blown tour as well to round things off. They’re also a band that draw in a wide range of ages; from the older rockers in their leather jackets …

It’s that time of year when every website / magazine / pundit-of-various-degrees-of-credibility produces their dreaded “end of year list”:  you know the sort of thing – the ten best albums / gigs / blow jobs /whatever.  And, yes, we at PM are just as guilty as everyone else… Of course, …

‘Twas a the week before Christmas and all through the house not a creature was stirring… but ’round the corner in the Limelight all manner of mayhem was taking place, as the holiday season turned into a right ol’ Thrashmess… With the ambient, grungy pop of Goodbye Nola entertaining but …

“It is almost  a tradition, that we finish our European tour in Glasgow” – said Eugene Hütz at the end of the vivid Gogol Bordello show at O2 Academy in Glasgow. The band has been touring all over Mainland Europe with their new album “Pura Vida Conspiracy”  and the tour …

A  cold wet Saturday finds me standing outside the O2 Academy in Glasgow for the highly anticipated Fields of the Nephilim / Mission gig. I heard about this gig last year in Birmingham when Wayne Hussey announced it on stage, could it be true my two favourite Goth bands on …

Friday, a dark December evening at The Cathouse in Glasgow and I’m surrounded by wandering metalheads, who came here to returning legends of the UK thrash scene, Xentrix. I must admit, I haven’t seen them or even the supporting act before live, so it was both fun and educational evening …

Slightly more than a year ago, the curtain came down on the long and storied career of the mighty Thin Lizzy, when the band played their penultimate gig on Irish soil as they bade farewell to touring and prepared to launch a new identity through which to progress the Lizzy …

Judging by the amount of people crammed into The Box on this Saturday night, it should be renamed The Sweat Box! It just goes to show the popularity of veteran UK  AOR band FM. Maybe they do not get 4 page spreads in certain magazines anymore  but this is the …

After interviewing bassist Marco Mendoza for Planetmosh, I made my way round to the venue full of entrepidation of Thursday nights event to come! Joining the gathering and growing crowd we watched the two supporting bands ( Western Sand and The Dead Daisies ) doing an amazing job of warming …

For any promoter to stage the amount of quality gigs which James Loveday puts on – this was his 45th straight ‘RocKD’ event of the year, not counting the number of visiting acts he has brought our way over the past 13 years – is no mean feat.  It’s not …

Forty-five years.  Forty-five fucking years.  Not only is that the length of time since Black Sabbath first unleashed their pioneering brand of heavy metal on a deeply unsuspecting world, and changed its musical landscape forever, but it also how long it has taken the genre’s founding fathers to appear on …

Beginning Hard Rock Hell’s final day for 2013 on the Jagermeister Stage are The Jokers (8), who like Wildside Riot take the bull by both horns and give it a right good kicking, songs Radio and the title track from latest album Rock and Roll is Alive impressing the punters who are once again emerging …

Ow. That’s probably the thoughts of many punters this morning, but this is a festival so one bravely soldiers on and has their hangover on away by whoever’s on first. Luckily for everyone in attendance, that turned out to be Wildside Riot (8), back for a second year running and opening …

So Hard Rock Hell has come and gone again. The seventh year of the festival, now in its second year at Hafan y Mor Haven Holiday Park in Pwllhelli, Wales was this year under the banner of Cirque du Rock, creating a nightmarish circus freak show that saw ringmasters, clowns and …

On arriving at the venue to request my reviewer’s pass i was asked why a webzine like Planetmosh would want to do a write up of The Damned. Maybe it was my long hair  that got the question asked but at the end of the day I love The Damned, …