Electric Boys Concert Review
THE ELECTRIC BOYS ARE BACK WITH A BANG
Show Date: September 10, 2009
Location: Malmo, Sweden
Venue: Debaser
Reviewer: Jacob Zetterholm
Photographer: Johan Weitner
Band Website: www.electricboys.com
After the demise of Hanoi Rocks earlier this year, the founders of Electric Boys, vocalist and guitarist Conny Bloom and bass player Andy Christell, decided to reunite the classic line-up with Franco Santunione on guitar and Niclas Sigevall on drums.
They have played a couple of festivals during the summer, as well as shows in Finland and supporting Thunder on their farewell tour in the U.K. Also, a ‘Best-of’ compilation called ‘Now Dig This!’ (with a rather hideous remix of “All Lips ‘N’ Hips”) saw the light of day a couple of months ago.
This night was the first of five club dates on a mini-tour of Sweden and the anticipation was palpable. People around me were obviously curious to hear what the band would sound like nearly twenty years after their heyday. Debaser holds about 450 people and though it wasn’t sold out it was pretty damn close from the looks of it. The Electric Boys were the only band on the bill and since I’ve waited more than two decades to see them a second time I was happy about that.
After a short intro the band kick-started the gig with “Psychedelic Eyes” and for the next hour and twenty minutes their special brand of funk-o-metal was in full effect. The band sounded great and it was especially cool to see Niclas beat the hell out of his kit again. He’s been living in Los Angeles for a long time and apparently hasn’t held a pair of drum sticks for over ten years prior to this reunion! You would never have guessed that seeing his stellar performance this night.
As Franco and Niclas had left the band before the release of their third and final album (1994’s ‘Freewheelin’) they’ve decided not to play anything from that album, which is fine by me, since there are so many killer tracks to choose from anyway. So the set consisted of a great mix of songs from the two versions of ‘Funk-O-Metal Carpet Ride’ such as “Freaky Funksters”, “Captain Of My Soul” and “The Change”, and from their second album they ripped through “Knee Deep In You” and “Groovus Maximus” just to name a few. They also played a brand new tune titled “Nowhere To Go But Up”, and it sounded like classic Electric Boys.
Before the night’s big power ballad “Dying To Be Loved”, Conny asked the people in the crowd who took the opportunity to have a beer break to bring one back for him. I hope someone granted his wish, he sure deserved it.
To me “Who Are You” and “Bad Motherfunker” stood out with extended jams and the encore was a wicked one-two punch of “Rags To Riches” and “All Lips ‘N’ Hips”.
The only minus I can think of was that they didn’t play their first hit (in Sweden anyway) “Get Nasty”. But I guess you can’t have everything.
According to their website Electric Boys will record a new album this year and hopefully a worldwide tour will be their next move. I highly recommend everyone to get on board the funk-o-metal carpet ride!
