Steelhouse Festival, 26 – 28 July 2024

Once you’ve driven up a two-mile track which, by the end of the weekend, left a once-black car covered in a thick layer of road dirt, Steelhouse Festival, on a mountain in beautiful Wales, is one hell of a party. And like most parties there are people you want to see again and others you’re pleased to meet for the first time; and then there’s a few that it’s nice to be acquainted with but you don’t feel the need to ever hook up with them again. The festival itself though is friendly and open and boasts a terrific vibe, and a weekend without rain certainly helped things along.

Trucker Diablo

TRUCKER DIABLO kicked things off at 4:30 on a hot Friday afternoon, starting well and pulling an enthusiastic bunch of fans to the front of the stage. Regrettably though, as Elles Bailey (who should have been third on that afternoon) had had to pull out because of illness at very short notice, the organisers had to quickly pull rabbits from a hat and announced two surprises. The first of these was from Sunday’s DAN BYRNE, who hastily pulled together a short, solo acoustic set. Top marks for innovation, but it did bring the tempo right down and as a result the excellent OLI BROWN & THE DEAD COLLECTIVE – who should have followed Trucker Diablo and increased the momentum caused by the opening act – really had to start from scratch. Joined by fellow guitarist Sam Wood and drummer Wayne Proctor, Oli Brown romped through a set of light and shade which was both heavy and bluesy, and certainly crowd pleasing.

Oli Brown & The Dead Collective

Surprise number two was another acoustic set, this time from TOBY JEPSON. It went down well, but, again, broke the momentum and left some of us thinking it would have been better to have given every band a longer stage time. Thank heavens then for KING KING who kicked things back into life big-time, before the BERNIE FEST ALL STARS collaborative showed just how great those early Whitesnake songs were. Led by guitarist Jim Kirkpatrick, the All Stars was basically ex-Skin frontman Nev MacDonald’s Hand Of Dimes, with Neil Murray on bass and a string of guests including Toby Jepson and Dan Byrne (again subbing for Ms Bailey), Chris Buck and Luke Morley. Any set that kicks off with ‘Come On’ and ‘Sweet Talker’ gets the nod as far as I’m concerned, and aside from two of Marsden’s solo songs the rest of the set – the dire ‘Is This Love’ aside – was prime-time Whitesnake. Are you ready an’ willing? You betcha...

Bernie Fest All Stars

Just couldn’t get there in time for Saturday’s 12:15 openers Zac And The New Men, but CREEPING JEAN were very groovy, a bit like a male-fronted Blues Pills, and drummer Tom Elliot certainly earned his keep. They take their name from a Kinks’ song, much as JAMES AND THE COLD GUN found their name in the Kate Bush back catalogue. Much more metal than the festival’s previous acts and veering into grunge territory at times they gave proceedings a healthy kick up the jacksie and warmed things up nicely for SOUTH OF SALEM. The Bournemouth-based ‘horror rockers’ (it says here) had a healthy following in terms of shirts on the day, and went down a storm, although personally I didn’t get it: it was all very nice, and not at all what I’d expected from a band with such a moniker.

The Warning

THE WARNING, Mexico’s premier all-sister power trio, weren’t as heavy as I’d expected either – their sound was quite thin at times – but the combination of Daniela (guitar / lead vocals), Paulina (drums / vocals) and Alejandra (bass / backing vocals) certainly kick up a storm and songs like ‘Queen Of The Murder Scene’ and ‘Six Feet Deep’ went down exceptionally well. PHIL CAMPBELL AND THE BASTARD SONS of course need no introduction whatsoever (I mean, it’s not really a festival without them) and they exude the Motörhead mantra that they are what they are and don’t care if you like them or not. The Motörhead songs seem to be reducing in number now although their take on ‘Heroes’ – as once unwisely covered by Phil, Lemmy and Mikkey Dee and on the day dedicated to Bernie Marsden – was, is, and will always be terrible.

Accept

It’s 42 years since I first saw ACCEPT, and they’re as good now as they were then. These days only lead guitarist Wolf Hoffmann remains from the band that toured the UK with Judas Priest in 1982, but the spirit lives on. With Joel Hoekstra filling in for Philip Shouse the three-guitar – all Flying V – attack was put to best use during ‘Pandemic’ when all three guitarists soloed away to their heart’s content. Aside from a couple from their latest album ‘Humanoid’ most of their set was early days crowd pleasers, with ‘Princess Of The Dawn’ going down amazingly well and a punter in the front row holding aloft a plush shark toy during – naturally – ‘Fast As A Shark’. As you do... Although Accept are a hard act to follow headliners SKINDRED are masters of their craft, and their mélange of reggae, rap and metal is heavy and heart-warming as they brought the day’s proceedings to a close. And it’s hard not to leap around to ‘Kill The Power’.

Cassidy Paris

It’s Sunday lunchtime, 25 or so degrees, and CASSIDY PARIS skips onstage wearing a coat! Based in Melbourne, her band features Welsh brothers Tom and Alex Rogowski on guitar and drums respectively, and her dad Stevie on bass. It’s happy, hoppy, poppy, metal – quite like Vixen at times – that’s easy on the ear at that time of day, and those that have woken up applaud her enthusiastically. DAN BYRNE followed on with a full band set: great voice, good songs, but you don’t need the f-bomb every time you talk to the crowd, Dan.

Jared James Nichols

If Frank Marino was supposed to have channelled the ghost of Jimi Hendrix, then JARED JAMES NICHOLS channels the spirit of Frank Marino. This was the band of the day for me, with a set full of truly self-indulgent Seventies’ soloing and all the better for it. Playing like Hagar without a colour fixation or Nugent with a brain, Nichols brought things to a close with a powerful rendition of ‘War Pigs’. As the climax approached his lead became unplugged, and what did he do? No hissy fit, no shouting at the hapless stage guy... He just plugged back in, laughed about it and brought the house down. A true showman.

The Commoners

I was advised to watch THE COMMONERS and they were another highlight of the day. Coming from Toronto, and coming at things from a Black Crowes angle, the band had a southern bluesy vibe going on with rich harmonies, elegant playing and a pervasive keyboard sound that as the icing on the cake. Less easy to pigeonhole – or to enjoy – were THE LAST INTERNATIONALE, who opened well with a rendition of ‘Kick Out The Jams’ and then floundered, with singer (and sometime bassist) Delila Paz wasting most of their precious stage time. With no label and no management it’s great to see a band doing it for themselves, but someone needs to tell them that when they’re firing on all cylinders in a RATM kind of way they’re great, but no one ever bought a record just because the singer jumped down into the crowd. Mr.Big’s Billy Sheehan jammed on the final song, but that’s about as memorable as it got.

The Last Internationale

So it was left to LIVING COLOUR to get things back on track once more. Having planned to play ‘Kick Out The Jams’ themselves they had a quick rethink, and added ‘Sunshine Of Your Love’ alongside ‘Nothing Compares 2 U’ and ‘Rock And Roll’. And of course you wouldn’t get far without ‘Cult Of Personality’. Vernon Reid remains one of the most unsung heroes in Guitarland, and frontman Corey Glover makes it all look so easy.

Living Colour

It’s a shame that MR. BIG’s glory days are long behind them, and they should really have done their farewell tour many years back. The songs were there, but it was all very ploddy, and the solos were exceptionally well played but rather tedious in this day and age: Sheehan’s lengthy solo introduction to ‘Shy Boy’ was – or at least seemed – longer than the song itself. Which just left THE ALMIGHTY to bring things home and, to be honest, they were something of a disappointment, seemingly relying on reputation rather than the excitement and aggression they were renowned for. I know we’re all a lot older than we were, and it was a setlist to die for, but, as Johnny Thunders once noted, ‘you can’t out your arms around a memory...and it doesn’t pay to try’.

Quite a few hits, a couple of misses, but overall a fabulous event and congratulations to all concerned.

© John Tucker July 2024