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ROCKLAHOMA 2014 By Larry Petro, News Monkey Wednesday, June 25, 2014 @ 10:24 AM
The Rocklahoma festival has come a long way since it's 2007 inception when, in my own personal opinion, it had the best lineup ever. It was an 80's hair band lover's wet dream, but not anymore. Festival organizers realized that in order for the festival to grow and become bigger and better they were going to have to diversify things a bit. Of course, it should come to the surprise of noone that indeed Rocklahoma has gotten bigger every year since that time, breaking it's own record every year including this year's version which amassed over 60,000 attendees. Not bad at all.
I attended Rocklahoma for the first time in 2011 but managed to catch the final day only, but it was enough to get a good feel of how things would be. So, in 2012 I attended the entire festival and did my first coverage for it. We skipped last year's event as we weren't too excited about the lineup but returned again this year, more impressed with the bands listed to play. Of course, what would Rocklahoma be without drama, right? The last time I was there the infamous QUEENSRYCHE debacle took place, with vocalist Geoff Tate telling those in the crowd 'you suck', a performance that would end up being his last with his former band mates. Only time would tell if drama would be on the list of those performing at this show.
DAY 1
After making the 7 1/2 hour drive from my home north of Houston to my brother's house in Tulsa and a short 6 hours of sleep, I was ready to rock! We made our way to the little town of Pryor, about a 45 minute drive northeast of Tulsa to meet up with my brother who had already procured our RV rental for the weekend and had our campsite completely set up. The party was about to begin!
Now, if you've never been to Rocklahoma, there are 3 stages inside the actual festival grounds; the Main Stage, the Hard Rock Stage and the Retrospect Records Stage. This is where the majority of the action takes place. Outside of this permimeter are the General Admission (GA) campgrounds, the VIP campgrounds, a shower facility and convenience store. There are also two other areas for band performances. The first is situated behind the shower facility and store and is the Axis Stage. For the most part, up and coming local area bands play here but ocassionally a lesser known national act will play there as well. The second 'stage' if you will is in the VIP camping area and is known as Camp Jager, as in Jagermeister. The stage here seems to change from year to year and this year it was set up on an 18 wheeler flatbed trailer. The party starts here every year on Thursday night (which I missed this year) and ends here as well Sunday night after all the other stages have gone dark for the year.
I had been eagerly watching the local weather reports at least a week in advance in the hope that no rain or storms would show up like they did in 2008. Oklahoma is known for severe weather and if the forecast included such, preparedness would be key. What started off as an 80% chance for Friday and Saturday shifted to Sunday and Monday, then a lower chance for Saturday and Sunday and eventually bottoming out near a 0% chance for the entire weekend. What a relief!
Since the main festival grounds don't open until 3 pm each day, that gives the concertgoer plenty of time to scope out their surroundings and plot their course of action for the weekend. So, in fashion, after imbibing the appropriate amount of liquid refreshment (spelled BEER) at our campsite, we made our way to the Axis tent to watch some live music to whet our appetities for the main acts that were to play inside.
The festival organizers have done a great job of staggering the bands between the Main and Hard Rock stages so that there is no overlap and one does not have to risk missing one band because you're watching another. However, that is not the case between the Hard Rock and Retrospect Records stages. There were always bands playing on each stage at the same time which led to some consternation and some tough choices.
Once inside we made a beeline for the Retrospect Stage to watch the festival get kicked off in kick ass fashion with none other than the KILLER DWARFS! To make their trip from Canada (eh?) more worthwhile the band played 4 shows in Texas just prior to Pryor, hitting Dallas, Houston and San Antonio where they played 2 shows. What was first thought to be a type-o in the performance times actually turned out to be a scheduling snafu and the DWARFS got the opportunity to do what none of the major acts at these festivals do; play twice! Not only did they get to kick off the 2014 Rocklahoma, they got to play again at midnight the following night. And kick things off they did, launching their quick 30 minute set with "Coming Through" from the band's most memorable release, 1990's Dirty Weapons. In fact, a large portion of the band's set was pulled from this album, including the ballad "Doesn't Matter" and set closer and title track "Dirty Weapons". The real highlight of this show is always the antics of frontman Russ Dwarf, and this show was no exception. During the song "Stand Tall", Russ took it literally and instead of his normal crowd surfing, he crowd stood, something he had never done before. Check out the video clip to see:
Next up was BLACK STONE CHERRY, a band that has played Rocklahoma a few times now and never disappoints. If you like southern, blues-infused hard rock then these guys are for you. We didn't catch too much of their set as there were other bands on the bill for the first day that we really wanted to see later on so we took the opportunity to grab some drinks and in the process missed NOTHING MORE and SKID ROW.
LACUNA COIL was next up and having become a fan of this quintet in recent years, it was great to catch them again, albeit at the expense of ALL THAT REMAINS, who, along with a couple of others, had to bail from the festival. Though I would have liked to have seen ATR, LACUNA COIL was a most suitable replacement. Out in support of the newest release, Broken Crown Halo, the Italians opened up their short set with "Trip The Darkness" from the Dark Adrenaline opus. The band actually played 3 tracks from the new CD, "Die & Rise", "Zombies" and "Nothing Stands In Our Way" before closing things out with "Our Truth". And as always, co-lead vocalist Cristina Scabbia is a pleasure to watch perform.
Back at the Main Stage we go, this time to catch East Coast metallers KILLSWITCH ENGAGE. This band came out firing on all cylinders, launching into their set with "A Bid Farewell", from the 2007 release The End Of Heartache. The band rolled through the rest of their set with songs that included "Always", "In Due Time" and "My Curse" before wrapping things up with their blistering cover of DIO's "Holy Diver", which appears on the Ronnie James Dio: This Is Your Life tribute disc.
As was mentioned before, with all of the good bands playing this festival, tough choices would have to be made, and in this case, we then opted to skip sets by THOUSAND FOOT KRUTCH and SEETHER so that we could have dinner. We returned in time to catch a Hard Rock Stage performance by the ever hot and talented Taylor Momsen and THE PRETTY RECKLESS. Sporting a slinky black, sleeveless dress with the gold cross/arrow logo on front, which appears on her bare back on the cover of their most recent album, Going To Hell, it was all seduction as they opened up their performance with a track from the new release, aptly titled "Follow Me Down". She writhed and gyrated her way through tracks like "Since You're Gone", "Sweet Things" and "Heaven Knows", at one point strking a very sensual pose back to back with guitarist Ben Phillips. Momsen and company closed out their set with the title track from the new album, "Going To Hell".
Next up was DEFTONES and, having seen them recently already, we chose to explore the festival grounds and see what vendors were out selling their wares. There was just about every type of food and drink imagineable, as well as apparel vendors like the fine people at Rock-n-Roll GangStar Apparel, the F#@k Cancer folks and even an I Love Vagina tent. Now I know where the guy walking around with the 'Vagitarian' T-shirt got it from. We all chose to make a stop at the Jack Daniels area where they were selling samples of various new blends of Jack and we chose to each get a shot of the new Honey Jack. Very tasty!
Our last stop for the day took us back to the Main Stage for the Day 1 headliner, FIVE FINGER DEATH PUNCH. But just prior to that, the MC of Rocklahoma, Eddie Trunk came out onstage with Miss Rocklahoma and auctioned off a FFDP autographed guitar. That's one thing I appreciate about Rocklahoma is that they do this every year with multiple guitars and such and all the proceeds get donated to Oklahoma local charities. This particular guitar sold for a whopping $18,000! Unbelievable! Now, on to FFDP. I had never seen them before and many people had been saying that these guys had been giving flat, somewhat boring performances of late, but I found it to be just the opposite. They were a great choice for one of the top acts and they did not disappoint. The California quintet of Ivan Moody, Zoltan Bathory, Jason Hook, Jeremy Spencer and Chris Kael just crushed the rest of the day's competition with their set, kicking things off with "Under And Over It" off of their third album, 2011's American Capitalist. They had the crowd on their feet and rocking, fists pumping as they continued to exploit the masses, rolling right from the opening number into "Burn It Down", which definitely seemed to fit the very warm, humid first day of Rocklahoma. Next up were the tracks "Hard To See" and "Lift Me up" before a nod to the old school with a cover of "Bad Company" by, who else, BAD COMPANY. Things then cranked right back up with the veritable love song, "Burn MF". It was humorous to watch Ivan chide the cameraman that was up front providing one of the video screen feeds. He kept telling him to point the camera out at the crowd, but he kept it focused on Ivan until finally Ivan went over and pulled the guy up onstage and nearly took his video setup from him and pointed it out at the crowd himself before he finally got the hint. The band closed out the Main Stage for Day 1 with "The Bleeding" from the band's very first offering, The Way Of The Fist from 2007. With no more big names scheduled to play any of the remaining stages for the rest of the evening and with myself still fighting off the drivelag from the previous night's trip up, plus the generous alcohol comsumption, we decided to call it an early night.
DAY 2
Since the doors didn't open until 3 we were in no rush to get up early and even so, I still found myself up at around 8 or 9 to a very pleasant, cool Oklahoma morning. One nice thing I had noticed, even in Texas, was that we had not yet hit the 90 degree temperature mark, something that hadn't happened in like 40+ years. Even without the generator running the AC in the RV we had rented, we had the dindows cracked and it made for a nice night's sleep and an even nicer morning as we enjoyed our coffee and made our plans for the day's events.
While eating lunch we encountered our first rain of the weekend. It poured for about 10 minutes and about the time we were finished eating the rain stopped and we headed over to the Axis Stage once again to catch such acts as JOINT EFFECT, THE GRIZZLY BAND and A COURSE OF ACTION before the main gates opened. While we were there another shower came over the grounds, lasting about the same length of time as the first, and then just as fast, it was gone. We did not see anymore rain the rest of the weekend.
Once inside the main grounds again we headed for the Hard Rock Stage for the opening performance of the day, this one by another Southern California band, GEMINI SYNDROME. The crowd in front of this side stage was quite large and Aaron Nordstrom and the rest of his crew took full advantage. Kicking off day 2 with a little "Pleasure And Pain", from the band's debut album Lux. It was followed up with "Falling Apart", during which Aaron actually came down off the stage and into the massive photographer's pit to stand up on the barricade and sing directly in touch with the fans. A classy move, indeed. Back to the stage he went for "Resurrection", "Basement" and the final cut, "Stardust". Another fine set from yet another band I had not yet seen before this weekend, but for God's sake, would someone please buy bassist Alessandro Paveri a steak or monster cheeseburger or something! That guy is almost literally skin and bones!
We managed to catch a portion of POP EVIL's set on the Main Stage, but having seen them the past couple of times we attended Rocklahoma, we chose to bypass their entire set (though they always put on a killer show) and head for dinner instead. Along the way we missed sets by DEVOUR THE DAY and FILTER, but with good reason. Following dinner I received a text from Rob Zakojc, business manager for the KILLER DWARFS. He and drummer Darrell "Dwarf" Millar were headed to our campsite for an informal interview. The Media Tent where nearly all interviews occurred was a very busy place, with different bands coming and going all day long and in most cases, journalists were given only a fraction of time to do their pieces with the artists. So, I had actually conversed with Darrell the prior week at the Houston show and ran the idea by him of them coming by our site to do an interview in a more relaxed atmosphere. He was very keen to the idea and thus they headed our way, accompanied by the manager's son and another woman who was a friend of the band. The manager, in a great show of honor and respect, showed up wearing an old school KNAC 105.5 tank top! It was great to just sit and hang out, drinking a beer or three and just shooting the shit, all of which got recorded. Look for that interview soon! We probably could have stayed there the rest of the day but the next performance we wanted to catch was JACKYL and so after nearly an hour of hanging out we all headed back into the concert grounds.
If you've never seen JACKYL perform before you really should do yourself a favor and check them out sometime. They are quite an entertaining band, especially frontman Jesse James Dupree. If he wasn't a rockstar he could definitely have pursued a career in comedy or even the pulpit. That's right, a preacher, because the way he handles himself onstage with the crowd is like he's preaching the rock n' roll gospel. Another great job by this band, playing the hits you would expect like "Down On Me", "I Stand Alone", "My Moonshine Kicks Your Cocaine's Ass", "Redneck Punk" and of course "The Lumberjack".
Next up would have been TRIVIUM on the Hard Rock Stage but unfortunately the band's lead singer Matt Heafy blew out his voice at another World's Loudest Month festival, Rock On The Range, and thus the band had to cancel all the rest of their appearances. Their replacement was Los Angeles rockers WE ARE HARLOT, relative newcomers to the scene in name only, having been formed by the lead singer of ASKING ALEXANDRIA, Danny Worsnop and guitarist Jeff George, formerly of Sebastian Bach. We took the opportunity to do some more perusing of the grounds and check out the official Rocklahoma merchandise that was available.
9:00 pm rolled around and it was time for the mighty TWISTED SISTER! This band really doesn't tour anymore per se, so just having them appear on this bill and getting the pleasure of seeing them live again was definitely one of the highlights of the weekend, though one of the 3 headline spots would have been preferred. But we can't have everything so all the crowd could do was accept the #2 billing this time around. The group was on fire as the came out of the starting gate with "Stay Hungry", the title track from the iconic 1984 breakthrough album. They went right into "Shoot 'Em Down'" and then "You Can't Stop Rock N' Roll" before stopping to take a breath. During this brief stoppage vocalist Dee Snider took the opportunity to address the crowd and rant just a bit about how other bands of their genre that came up around the same time as TS can't seem to get along and whine about not being able to get their record out because of it (RATT anyone?), and how TWISTED SISTER is all original and they get along with other great. Following this brief vent, the band kicked it up once again with "The Kids Are Back", "I Believe In Rock N' Roll", "We're Not Gonna Take It", "The Fire Still Burns", "The Price", "Burn In Hell" and "I Wanna Rock" before finishing off the crowd with "Born To Raise Hell". It was amazing to see how little Dee Snider has changed over the years, especially when compared to the other members. Guitarist J.J. French, for example, looks an awful lot like RUSH's Alex Lifeson these days. Tahnkfully, looks mean nothing when it comes to TWISTED FUCKING SISTER!
At this point we would have headed to the Retrospect Records Stage to catch a reincarnated HELLION, fronted by vocalist Ann Boleyn, and they were listed on the schedule but unfortunately I was given the heads up ahead of time that they would not be performing. Why, I do not know, but it was somewhat disappointing as there was a string of several bands playing this stage that I was looking forward to. Instead, back to the Hard Rock Stage it was to see East Coast rockers KIX, another band that has rejuvenated itself of late and just announced that a new album is on the way. They got off to a somwhat rocky start however, as there appeared to be some sort of sound issue. Frontman Steve Whiteman's vocals could not be heard for the first couple of songs, "No Ring Around Rosie" and "Midnite Dynamite" before they got it resolved. From that point on though it was balls out, with tracks like "Sex", "Girl Money" and "Cold Blood". They even whipped out a brand new track from the new, forthcoming album Rock Your Face Off, "Love Me With Your Top Down". "Blow My Fuse" concluded the evening for these Baltimore natives.
Second day headliners STAIND were up next and I have to say with no offense to the band that they should never be headlining a rock festival on any day. Don't get me wrong, some of their music is okay, it's just that it's too damn depressing, especially when they had to follow the mighty TWISTED SISTER. Everyone was on such a rock n' roll high from their performance that STAIND was a complete downer for many in the crowd. And I swear if I didn't know any better, it was their music that caused my brother's beer to commit suicide and go flat in just a short walk from the vendor to the back of the festival grounds.
Back to the Retrospect Stage we went to catch the second performance from the KILLER DWARFS who, unlike their opening day performance, were given about 15-20 minutes longer set time. The stage had changed just a bit from the day before and Darrell Dwarf now had a small riser for his drum kit and they also had a frame assembly to attach their backdrop to. Of course, the additional time was welcomed as the band added a couple more tunes, including one that I had actually mentioned to Darrell the day before that I thought they should play, "Last Laugh" from the Dirty Weapons album. Another great set by the DWARFS. After the show we went and hung out with the guys for a bit behind the tent and wished them a safe trip home as they would be departing the next morning. Little did we all know that less than 48 hours later they would be involved in a major car accident while driving home to Canada through Indiana, causing Russ "Dwarf" Graham to have to be airlifted to a local hospital. Luckily noone was seriously injured and the gear survived largely unscathed.
DAY 3
After another great, unseasonably cool Oklahoma evening it was time for the third and final day of Rocklahoma. From the inital looks of it, it was going to be a somewhat busy day for me as I had 2 interviews lined up, one with EXTREME guitarist Nuno Bettencourt and the other with Tom Keifer of CINDERELLA, who was performing at the festival with his solo band. Remember that drama I mentioned early on in this review? Well, it would rear its ugly head on this last afternoon/evening.
My interview with Nuno was scheduled for 4:45 that afternoon and was one of only a very few that were scheduled at all (I personally do not know if any others were actually scheduled besides mine). That scheduled time also meant that I would probably miss out on a good protion, if not all, of Tom Keifer's set as he was to take the stage at 4:55. At 2:45 I recieved an email stating that Nuno was running late and asking if we could just play our interview time by ear (evidently Nuno traveled separately from the rest of the band and got in late the day of the show). I responded that was cool with me as long as it didn't interfere with my Keifer interview, which I had scheduled for 6:45. That actually freed me up to catch Tom's set.
Just prior to Tom opening his set, the sky had been a mix of sun and clouds, with the clouds being a welcome sight as Sunday turned out to be the hottest of the 3 day festival and right before his time a large cloud had been covering the sun making it definitely more comfortable in the late afternoon. But as he took the stage that cloud decided to move (imagine that) and since the Rocklahoma Main Stage faces west, the entire setup was now directly in the sun's glare. Of course Tom came out to open things up wearing a black leather jacket. The guy had to be burning up, and he was, literally and figuratively, kicking it off with "Night Songs", the title track from CINDERELLA's debut release. Tom's voice shows little difference from the way it was prior to him blowing it out many years ago and the accompanying surgeries that ensued thereafter. He kept thing moving along with the newest single from his first ever solo effort The Way Life Goes, "It's Not Enough". Of course, no Tom Keifer show would be complete without the required CINDERELLA hits, and he delivered with tracks like "Somebody Save", "Nobody's Fool" and the ballad "Don't Know What You Got (Till It's Gone)", for which his wife Savanna joined him onstage for the first part of the song. He performed another track from his solo effort, "Solid Ground", before jumping right back to the CINDERELLA hit "Shelter Me", then his own spin of THE BEATLES' classic "With A Little Help From My Friends", which he absolutely belted out with full vocal intensity before closing out the day with "Gypsy Road".
We took our required dinner break at this point and missed sets from EVE TO ADAM and HEAVEN'S BASEMENT before returning just in time for Zakk Wylde and the rest of BLACK LABEL SOCIETY. Now, I had planned this just right so that I could shoot the first 3 saongs of BLS before I had to hike off to the media tent for my Tom Keifer interview but unfortunately the stage crew were not cooperating and they ran behind schedule getting BLS on stage just enough that i had to ditch my plans to shoot photos of them and head to my interview.
Now, whilst waiting outside the media tent for my Keifer interview I received yet another email from EXTREME's management stating that they were "running really, really late" and that we might not be able to do the interview after all. Okay I said, just let me know. I would not hear anything again for the rest of the night and considering that EXTREME were set to play at 7:35, I wasn't really holding my breath. I did my Tom Keifer interview and, in the meantime, missed the BUTCHER BABIES set. Check out the Tom Keifer interview right HERE.
So now it was time for EXTREME. The band was using the Rocklahoma show as a springboard to their European Pornograffiti Live tour where they would be performing the iconic Pornograffiti album in it's entireity. Up until this point in the entire festival the bands had been virtually right on the time schedule, other than the brief delay in BLACK LABEL SOCIETY's set. For some reason they just could not get things right with EXTREME's equipment/sound setup and ended up running 30 minutes behind! They finally took the stage at nearly 8:15 to the sounds of "Decadence Dance", from the aforementioned Pornograffiti opus. Gary Cherone and friends gave a solid, if somewhat uninspired performance, with songs like "Kid Ego", "More Than Words" and "Mutha". The real drama kicked in during the final number, "Get The Funk Out". They had really just started getting into the meat of the song when Cherone makes a motion to his bandmates, allegedly to take it down a half step in tuning (?). Not more than 30 second to a minute later guitarist Nuno Bettencourt is seen taking off his guitar, handing it to a roadie and walking off stage. The band continues on with the song and another minute later bassist Pat Badger disappears behind the amps and he too is gone. That leaves just Cherone and drummer Kevin Figueiredo together to try and finish the song, which fails miserably. It appeared that Cherone was not even aware that his other members had deserted him, at one point looking around the stage and stating that he 'didn't know where the band went'. What a completely disastrous ending to their set. Video of the incident was posted to YouTube within a few days after Rocklahoma, only to have EXTREME's management have the video pulled. What exactly the deal was, noone seems to know, save the band themselves and they obivously aren't talking about it.
We now headed to the Hard Rock Stage for KYNG's set. This 3 piece outfit out of L.A. put on a hard driving, fantastic set. I encourage you to check them out! They got things started with "Burn The Serum", the title track from their brand new album that was released just a little over a month before Rocklahoma. It's always amazed me how much sound you can get from just 3 members (RUSH anyone?) and KYNG certainly delivers. This was my first exposure to the band and I was definitely blown away by their musicianship. From what I can recall, they played "Trails In Veins", "I Don't Believe" and set closer "Falling Down". You will probably be hearing more from this outfit in the future.
After a short respite we again returned to this very same stage, this time for the Philip Anselmo-led DOWN. They came out and obliterated everyone else that had played previously that day and the crowd was ready for it. The sea of bodies began an endless cycle of moshing and crowd surfing as soon as they stormed the stage with "Eyes Of The South" from the band's debut album NOLA and didn't let up until the closing number "Bury Me In Smoke", during which it appeared that every member of the road crew took the stage and grabbed an instrument of some kind. It was mass pandemonium up there, but in a good way. At one point Anselmo chided the security that was on hand, telling them not to stop anything that was going on unless someone was getting hurt or there was a fight to break up. The crowd roared its approval and continued with their sweaty endeavors. Definitely the most agressive performance of the day.
And that brings us to the last main performance of Rocklahoma, third day headliner KID ROCK. When he hit the stage the place was more packed than I had seen it all weekend. You have to give the guy credit for one thing; he does bring in the crowds and as an entertainer he puts on a great show, at least for his style and what he does. Kicking off his headline set with "Devil Without A Cause" from his 1998 album of the same name. He followed it up with "You Never Met A Motherfucker Quite Like Me", "American Bad Ass" and "Forever". Now, it's really hard to take the guy seriously though when a lot of his songs a) contain a riff ripped off from another artist or b) he name drops another song title in the lyrics. There were at least 4 or 5 such instances of this during his set which is a total turn off. And then there's the 10-15 minute interlude of him playing DJ and doing the whole album scratching thing. Really? This is a rock show for Pete's sake! If you want to do the whole rapper DJ thing then go do it in a club, not a rock festival. It was during this time that I made the decision to go meander around in the crowd for a while. While on this little foray I saw probably the funniest thing I had seen all weekend. driving by me was a long bed golf cart with a couple of the security detail riding it with a shirtless gentleman, handcuffed, was riding on the back seat facing backwards. They were taking this guy somewhere but not more than about 20 feet behind this moving cart was one of this guy's friends (I assume) following behind with his cell phone, videoing the entire incident, much to the chagrin of the guy who was handcuffed as he kept jawing at him the entire way. And off into the distance they went. Back to the KID ROCK set, he finished up his performance with "Only God Knows Why", "Born Free" and "Bawitdaba". Can someone please explain to me exactly what the hell 'Bawitdaba' is? At any rate, that drew the 2014 Rocklahoma to a close.
All in all it was a great weekend of fun, music and friends. A hats off to the organizers for another stellar festival. Knowing that you can't please everyone with the artists they bring every year is certainly a daunting task, but they have done a wonderful job of mixing things up between old and new and you really can't complain about that. I've met a lot of people and made quite a few new friends and can't wait to do it all again next year!
Check out the Rocklahoma photo gallery right HERE.
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