Massive/Sour Tusk –
Corporation, Sheffield, Saturday 6th August, 2022
Set List: Mission From God/Pretty Ugly/Ready To Play/Hail Hail Rock 'N' Roll/Proud Mary/Drinking Man/Midnight/Turn It Up/Man Of The Cloth/It's Alright/Desert Punk/Under My Skin/Ramones/Crazy/Gay Bar.
Well this was gonna be a three band affair but sadly Misery's Smile had to pull out of the show a few days prior due to illness, meaning Sour Tusk got upped to direct support to those up and coming Aussie Heroes!
This gave the magnificent threesome a chance to perform a longer set to a bigger audience which they took full advantage of, slamming them with their Motorhead-styled Rock N' Roll that Mr. Kilmister would have been proud of. I think I may have mentioned him in a review or two before, so slap me for repeating myself - Lol!
What struck me straight away was how fresh and clear the sound was for the 'Tusk tonight with everything fully audible in the mix, giving you the chance to hear every single word of all the songs in their set which made a pleasurable change to a brutal wall of noise that has often been the case in the past.
As per usual it's like an abrasive Panto' onstage with the only thing missing being throwing sweets to the kiddies out there. But since there aren't any children in the room, we got hurled abuse instead!!! Oh plus a few instructions like telling us to buy some beer from the bar to stop the barmaid getting bored and maybe a compliment or two – hahaha! Well it's one way to have folk buy a f*ck*ng shirt or CD right?
The Massive Drum kit took a pelting from those Pellwood Drumsticks that Nic had recently been endorsed with – Congrats on that Mate – you deserve it, whilst Neil throbbed away on that Rickenbacker bass and Jake played that Schecter Guitar splendidly as well.
A very colourful cross section of songs that were both new and old from their repertoire that saw classics like 'Turn It Up!' rub shoulders with the more recently penned cut 'Man Of The Cloth' plus covers they have become locally renowned for such as their rendition of CCR's 'Proud Mary' that they've truly made their own.
Then there is of course the song that is now a tribute to Lemmy and those New York Punk legends too: 'RAMONES' – 2 mins of ear-splitting Rock 'N' Roll without a chance of coming up for an ounce of breath! And how can I not mention 'Drinking Man' that many of us love to hear and their version of 'Gay Bar' that closes the show which I gotta say is much more preferable to the original by Electric Six.
I love the fact that they split the lead vocals between Mr. Rudd and Mr. Johnson respectively, with each member of the band hammering in some well delivered backing vocals at every needed moment, giving a warm 'n' full sound. Maybe one day Mr. Charlesworth will get to sing a song or two for us.
Sour Tusk never fail to impress and they just get better and better in both a musical and comedic value. One band you cannot ignore! Why? Because they won't f*ck*n' let you! Simple as that! Huzzah!
Set List: Rise/Hollywood/Roses/Blood Money Blues/Big Trend Setter/Dancefloor/Bring Down The City/Reset/Bohemian Rhapsody/One For The Road/Now Or Never/Ghost/One By One.
Now I first caught this band live three years ago at an outdoor festival in Newark which saw the Aussie boys make a stand complete with monsters hahaha. This time around these Aussie boys are indoor in our own city of Sheffield to show us what have got going.
It's been a long time coming what with the bullshit hitting the fan called you know what... they had a tour cancelled and were stranded getting home, But that is the thing that some bands will do for Rock 'N' Roll – put it 1st before even considering the crazy consequences that were unwantedly landed upon us by those in control.
Anyways, they made it here... well half that band anyway in the form of their Drummer, Andrew Greentree and Frontman/Guitarist, Brad Marr alongside the bassist Scott Chegg from Gorilla Riot who had stepped in at last minute plus a Guitarist who was actually from Berlin too called Marius Lallensack.
This is the band's Ten years Still Massive Tour – Yes they have been going that long. Gig 7 of their 15 date UK Leg and still going strong. Brad could even tell us how long it was since they had played there last gig due to that big P taking toll of all the shows all over the world but nothing was going to stop them rock it up here in Sheffield.
It's a stonking set with over half of it coming from their debut album 'Full Throttle' one from 'Rebuild Destroy' and a couple from' Destination Somewhere' plus the new cuts from 2022 and 2021 respectively in the form of the fast and powerful 'Rise which opened the show and the tell it how the world is right now 'Reset' that comes about halfway in. They even sampled some of our UK beer as well – god help 'em there – hahaha – they appeared to like the offerings all the same.
Massive were even raising money on this tour for Kayla's neuroblastoma campaign. Who as a post on their Facebook page states is 'a little girl they met in Norwich who is fighting stage 4 cancer'. They sent a big collection box around and plenty of notes went in there proving that not all folk from Sheffield are tight! Good on ya!
In order to give 3 of the band a well earned breather, Brad took to the acoustic guitar and asked us what we wanted to hear. Someone shouted to 'Master Of Puppets' and we were treated to exactly that – well a few bars anyway before the vocals kick in before he tore the room a new asshole or door should I say by performing a note perfect on both vocals and guitar rendition of Queen's 'Bohemian Rhapsody'!
This Mercury classic was a sure-fine highlight of the set since there was no safety net on a number like this – you either nail it or you get nailed for your errors instantly. He couldn't have done it any better and had us singing away with him in an instance like we at 'A Night At The Opera' – even going for the Galileo parts that even the band themselves copped out on!
Other standouts of the night included the energetic 'Hollywood' that lives up to the place itself; the tongue-in-cheek working class humour of 'Blood Money Blues'; the booming disco beat-filled 'Dancefloor'; the anthemic and gutsy 'Bring Down The City' with its crushing riffs and syrupy, flowing chorus; the power-ballad that is 'Ghost' and bringing it all to an end with the tremendous Rock 'N' Roller 'One By One'.
There really must be something in the water in Australia because they are always of fine form and ticked all the right boxes and pressed all the right buttons. A class night and a halfway decent turnout too.
Review & Photographs by Glenn Milligan