Archive for the ‘yngwie malmsteen’ Category
Yngwie Malmsteen Concert Review, Dallas, TX 110211
Lucky me. Twice in one week I got to see another one of my all-time favorite bands/musicians. Yngwie! I think this was 8th time I have seen him since 1986 (Triumph/Yngwie). Even though many of his recent albums have been a bit lackluster, he’s still quite entertaining live and just being able to watch him play is worth it.
I’ve been working out of town during the week in Dallas for the last 3+ months and haven’t really explored the music scene up here much and regrettably missed some quality shows, but there was no way I was going to miss this one. I bought my ticket on Monday at Wal*Mart of all places. They were the nearest Ticketmaster hub to my hotel. I don’t like going there and it just felt weird buying a concert ticket there. But no bother.
Last night’s show was at the House of Blues in downtown Dallas. I went down right after work and it only took a few minutes to get there from the office. It was a bit odd, though. Downtown Dallas is huge but last night it seemed like such a desolate place. Other than the parking lot outside of the venue, I didn’t see anyone out and about. Maybe the cold front that blew in that evening kept some folks away. I liked it down there, though. I love city living…concrete and steel for me!
Doors opened to the venue at 7PM and I got there around 6PM. Because of the storm that was brewing, I decided to just eat there. Wasn’t too bad but of course a bit overpriced.
Checked out the merch booth and didn’t see anything that really caught my eye.
Opening band went on promptly at 8. They were called Little Green Men and hailed from Fort Worth. While they played a tight set and there were some good guitar solos, the band was not my thing, not in the least. I was pretty bored and just wanted them to stop playing. Just give me some Yngwie!
After clearing the stage, you could see the full Yngwie stage setup. The drums were set at the back left corner of
Marshall City!
the stage almost behind the wall of Marshalls…17 cabinets and 27 heads. No, really! I think that was the biggest setup I’ve seen him use ever. Of course most are only for show, but still…80s excess at its finest! The keyboard player was at the far left of the stage almost completely out of sight and the bassist hung around that side as well. I mean, c’mon. This IS the Yngwie show, right?
The lights die down and you hear the keyboard intro to Rising Force (From Odyssey), then the drums kick in and the band hits the stage and kicks into the song full force. For as much as I have slagged Ripper Owens over the years, he sounded pretty good going into the set, much better than he sounded when I saw him with Yngwie in San Antonio a couple of years ago. The setlist stuck with a lot of newer material and I think that’s mostly because Ripper can’t sing a lot of the Joe Lynn/Jeff Scott Soto era stuff. Not many can. He did sound good on Never Die as well.
They got to Dreaming mid-set and for the first half of the song, Ripper sounded great. I was shocked…then after
Yngwie unleashing the fooking fury!
that, I don’t know happened, but for the last part of that song, he sounded like he was singing something different. Sure, the lyrics were right but he had gotten so out of key that it was painful to hear. Not sure if he lost his inner-ear monitors or what, but the end of that song was horrid. It then kicked into Gates of Babylon and he sounded fine in that.
I’m sorry, but he can’t carry the Turner/Soto stuff. I really wish Yngwie could find someone else who can handle all eras of the band vocally. Not to mention that Ripper sounds so “enhanced” on the last 2 Yngwie albums.
Patrick Johansson is a killer drummer, unfortunately all you could hear was his kick and snare. He had toms, but they were so low in the mix that they didn’t matter. Same with the keys and bass. There were a few moments where Yngwie and the keyboardist were playing together and you could hear him somewhat and the guy was really good. The bass was practically non-existent, which is typical for an Yngwie show.
Now we get to Yngwie. The giant Swede. The man took what Uli Roth and Ritchie Blackmore and created a whole new genre. Sure, in recent years he plays fewer riffs and just solos everywhere, but he’s still incredible and fun to watch. The last 3 times I have seen him, he really seems to be having fun on stage. He has mastered the art of kicking guitar picks into the crowd. I think Rick Nielson of Cheap Trick is the only person to throw out more picks.
I stayed back by the soundboard for the show. Attendance seemed to be around 300-350, not too shabby, but seemingly small for a club that holds 1700.
It was a fun show. Not my favorite show that I’ve seen of his, but still quite enjoyable. I try not to miss him if I can help it. I’m glad he’s still out there touring and still glad I’m able to see it.
Setlist as I remember it:
Rising Force
Never Die / Shot Across the Bow
Overture
Critical Mass
Badinerie
Far Beyond the Sun / Star Spangled Banner
Enemy Within
Red Devil
The Damnation Game / Baroque & Roll
Live To Fight (Another Day)
Dreaming / Gates Of Babylon
(Rainbow cover)
Into Valhalla
Trilogy Suite Op: 5
Red House
Fugue
Heaven Tonight
Encore:
Black Star / Cherokee Warrior
As Above, So Below
I’ll See the Light Tonight
Classic Buttons
I was never much of a button collector but I bought a few. Here are 2 of the 3 I know that I had. The other was a Stryper button from 1985 (my first metal show) that I lost a few years back.
The Yngwie one came from Triumph/Yngwie 1986. Thomas’ dad took us to the show. He sat in the rafters while we stayed close to the front. Triumph was on the Sport of Kings tour and Yngwie was on the Trilogy tour. Jeff Scott Soto had come back into the band for the tour. Don’t really know why Boals left but we were all happy to see JSS on stage. Both bands were great. I couldn’t afford a shirt so a button was my souvenir.
The other is from Iron Maiden/Anthrax in 1991. I am pretty sure that I bought a Maiden shirt that likely disintegrated shortly after the show.
Yngwie and Anthrax buttons (click to enlarge)
Flashback Yngwie Malmsteen Concert Review 5/7/06
So, the promoter called me Sunday afternoon to let me know that Yngwie was going to be brought in to our record store. Of course I dropped 
everything, grabbed all my Yngwie related CD covers and flew up there. I got there about 5 minutes before Yngwie and was just hanging out talking to the 4 NAVY guys who were there buying tickets. They had just gotten back from a tour in the Middle East that morning at 5AM and were excited to see Yngwie. As they were going on and on about how happy they were to see the show, Yngwie walks in and I said, “Hey guys, look who just walked in.” They fell silent and looked almost scared. They wouldn’t speak to Yngwie except to say, “Hey man, we’ll see you at the show tonight.” Yngwie shook their hands and went looking through our DVDs selecting a bunch of Deep Purple and DIO era Rainbow stuff.
It was Yngwie and the drummer and I started talking to drummer while helping Yngwie find a few things. The drummer, Patrick Johansson, played on the 2 recent Yngwie albums as well as toured with WASP in the last year. We were chatting and Yngwie was just having a good time talking to the owner about Rainbow and Blackmore. He was all smiles and his arrogance was at a minimum. The store owner, Steve, mentioned that he had a ’74 Strat in the store and Yngwie instantly said, “I’ll buy it. Right now. Give it to me. $4000. Where is it?” Steve said it wasn’t for sale as it was his very first guitar. Yngwie said, “Fair enough, I can respect that.”
So after buying the DVDs we snapped a few pics with Yngwie and he was in good spirits saying, “This is the first place on the tour where we have been treated so well. Thank you, thank you, thank you.” Patrick was so very cool and gracious as well. I pull out all of my CD covers and Yngwie signs them all commenting on each album. “Steeler? Man, what a dreadful album!” He then looked at me and said, “Sean, are you coming to the soundcheck? You should really come by, it’ll be cool, yeah?” So of course I went. As I am walking in, the promoter gives me 3 all access passes. You can read about the soundcheck and stuff here.
As we arrived at the theatre I called Patrick to tell him that I have the WASP DVD that he wanted and we hung out for a little while backstage. He asked for my cell number to keep in touch and told me to program his number into my phone book. Very cool. He also gave me a copy of one of his other bands called Kinlin. “Call me and let me know what you think of it.” Of course I agree. He heads back to bus and I head back into the main area of the theatre as the opening band is about to start.
They were called Orange Sky. They are from Trinidad and were OK overall. They were very tight but I didn’t really care for their style. Very nice guys though. The whole crowd was sitting down during their performance. As soon as they finished, I just walked up front and stood on the edge of the stage in front og Yngwie’s pedals to secure my spot. My 2 cohorts were up there as well. I found it odd that until 5 minutes before showtime, everyone stayed in their seats. Maybe they thought you couldn’t stand in front of the stage. Who knows? Didn’t matter, I was up there and everyone followed suit.
Right before everyone came up out of their seats, my friend Shelly and her friend rolled in and we talked for a bit. They stayed next to us on the edge of the stage all night. It was very cool.
The lights start to dim and you can hear Yngwie soundchecking for a minute ripping some serious shred. I forgot my earplugs and knew I was in for a loud night.
Then the lights went all the way down and the keyboard intro to Rising Force came on. The show has now started. For the first few songs, Yngwie looked a little stiff in his playing but seemed to loosen up by the 3rd song. He was awesome, of course. He threw out a ton of picks, of course. He somehow cut open the pinky finger of his picking hand but it didn’t phase him int he least. He was just incredible. Derek Sherinian was on keyboards, Doogie White was on vocals and Mick Cervino was on bass. It was certainly Yngwie’s show. If Doogie wasn’t singing, he stood in the back with the rythm section. The only one seemingly having fun other than Yngwie was Patrick. Unlike the last time I saw Yngwie (2001), he really looked like he was having fun.
The show over all was really good. He played several tracks from the new album which is very good and threw in some oldies as well as a few covers. During one of his solos, he crouched down in front of me and asked me to hold my hands out. People kept trying to grab his Strat but he set it down on my hands and played his solo while I held it. That was pretty cool.
After the show ended, we all hung out in the lobby until it was time to go backstage. There were about 20 of us and the whole band came in except for Derek and the bassist. Yngwie sat and signed everything that everyone had with them but made it a point to come up to us and say how happy he was to have been treated so well and to have met such nice folks. I was still amazed at how humble he seemed. They said that the night before was a disaster in northern Virginia.
I basically hung out with Patrick and Doogie until it was time to go. We all had a great time and it was great to get a few new connections. Patrick asked me to come to Miami this summer after the tour. I told him, “We’ll see.”
Then we went home.
Setlist:
Rising Force
Demon Driver
Bandiniere
Cracking the Whip
Crown of Thorns
Exile
Adagio
Star Spangled Banner
Far Beyond the Sun
Paraphrase into Dreaming
Gates of Babylon(!!!)
Baroque and Roll
Revolution
Demon’s Eye (Deep Purple!!!)
Trilogy Suite
Red House
Fugue (from the Concerto album)
You Don’t Remember, I’ll Never Forget
(Encore)
Black Star
I’ll See the Light Tonight
Never Die and Locked & Loaded were on the list but they skipped them.
