Doro Concert Review, Houston, TX, March 8, 2015

First and foremost, I need to get this out of the way…“apology accepted”. Those were the words Doro said to me last night after I apologized for my Butthead moment with her back in 1988. She thought it was very funny actually. It had always been in the back of my mind anytime I’d think of Warlock or her, so I’m glad I finally got to get that off my conscience.

When I saw that Doro was coming to Texas again (last time was 2007 in San Antonio but I couldn’t make it), I got a ticket ASAP. I absolutely love Warlock. The drive to Houston yesterday and the return home today were tough as it was a heavy rain both days.

Upon arrival to my hotel, I was relaxing a bit after a nice hot shower and looking at Instagram and saw that Johnny Dee, Doro’s drummer, ate at the ramen place next to the venue. I was very hungry and this sounded like a good idea on such a cold and rainy night. It was an incredible pork broth, noodle, ground pork, chopped pork, hot sauce, bok choy concoction that set me just right.

After the meal I go to the venue and run into some friends and hung with them for most of the night. There were 4 opening bands, 3 of which were local and one from Santa Cruz called Archer. I missed the first opener and couldn’t really get into the other 2 local bands at all. Archer was a decent 3 piece of heavy rock band that is touring with Doro.

The crowd had thinned out some. It wasn’t packed in there by any stretch but by the time Doro came on, I’m guessing about 150 were still around. The band hits the stage and opens up with I Rule the Ruins and plowed right into Earthshaker Rock. The band sounded awesome and I couldn’t believe how great her voice was. She looked and sounded like it was still 1988 and she is very appreciative of her fans. You could tell how much she loved being up there and seeing familiar faces in the crowd. Some people had traveled from Luxembourg to be there as well as other parts of the USA and Mexico. I love that.

The setlist was filled with songs from all four Warlock albums. It was awesome hearing Out of Control and I freaked when they played Evil from the Fight for Rock 12″. She played a handful of songs from the solo career as well including 2 from her new album, Raise Your Fist In the Air. Hearing Metal Racer just blew me away. They performed the cover of Dio’s Egypt (The Chains Are On) and it was just perfect. I’ve always loved her cover of that.

It was just a wonderful set, which of course I wanted more Warlock songs. Just play all night, ok? After the show I got to spend a little time with Johnny Dee which was cool. I’ve always liked that self-titled Britny Fox album, even though I despise most of that hair band stuff. That riff on Long Way to Love is killer. After talking with Johnny, I was afforded a moment to get on the bus with Doro. It was a cool few minutes. She signed The Book and my Triumph and Agony CD. The tour manager was rushing me off the bus so I didn’t get the other Warlock CDs signed, but he did call me “assman”. I didn’t take but a couple of photos as I really just wanted to stand there and take it all in.

Stay hard, true as steel!