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SLASH featuring MYLES KENNEDY & THE CONSPIRATORS Live in Northfield, OH

By Geoff Ketler, Cleveland Contributor
Thursday, July 24, 2014 @ 4:27 PM

Playing an “off-date” while touring with AEROSMITH

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While AEROSMITH took a couple days off from their current tour, opening act SLASH feat. MYLES KENNEDY & THE CONSPIRATORS used the opportunity to rock out the Hard Rock Live stage at the casino in Northfield, Ohio. This venue recently opened and has started to attract a wide range of talent; from YES to CHEAP TRICK, the mid-sized theater has been packing them in as of late. SLASH was no exception.

As the place began to fill up, opener CHARM CITY DEVILS took the stage. The quintet from Baltimore, Maryland really got the stagnant crowd moving. The short set was highlighted by the song “Devil Is A Woman” but also unfortunately included a tumbling fall on stage by guitarist Nick Kay. Apparently having slipped on some spilt water on stage, he took a fall that was serious enough to garner being checked out by paramedics. In true rock n’ roll form he seemed to shake it off and kept on playing. Despite the hiccup, the band continued to put on an energetic set. Check them out:

https://www.facebook.com/charmcitydevils

At the stroke of 8:30 pm the lights went down and SLASH feat. MYLES KENNEDY & THE CONSPIRATORS erupted onto the stage to the tune of “Hard & Fast”. Since there was no photo pit, I had to politely try to stand in front of the fans in the first row to get my shots. If you were one of those people, my apologies and I hope you enjoyed the rest of the show. At any rate, this was my first opportunity to see Myles Kennedy live. Wow. Just wow. The man has chops. His wide vocal range fits the expansive setlist like a glove. From “Paradise City” to “Slither” Myles Kennedy effortlessly hit note after note. Enough can’t be said about how tight the band was as a whole. Hats off to Todd Kerns, Brent Fitz, and Frank Sidoris on bass, drums, and rhythm guitar respectively for pulling off a flawless performance and keeping the set flowing. I can’t recall there being any dead time at all. Each song just seemed to pour out one right after another. The perfect example of what a live show should be.

The set was predominately made up of SLASH’s solo material including several new songs off of the upcoming album World On Fire, but peppered in there were plenty of GUNS N’ ROSES tunes and even a cover of VELVET REVOLVER’s “Slither”. It is nice to see that although SLASH pushed copious amounts of new material on us, he also wasn’t afraid to reach back and pull out the old GNR hits that everybody knows. Highlight of the night for me was the last three songs of the set before the encore. “You’re A Lie”, “Sweet Child O’ Mine” and “Slither” rounded out the set and captured the essence of some of the best material to come from all three of SLASH’s groups; his solo career, GUNS N’ ROSES, and VELVET REVOLVER. It was the perfect way to end the night.