The “Back in the ring” CD and tour have been a great success for the Dutch rockers of Vengeance so far. This evening it was again party time with singer/shouter/entertainer Leon Goewie in the spotlight as usual. His voice is still doing remarkably well, so the audience could really enjoy party hard rock classics like “My heaven strike me down” and “Rock ‘n roll shower”. The encore was of course “ Arabia”, during which Goewie was dressed like an Arabian sheik, making the crowd go wild. A short but very good and entertaining show of one of Holland’s best rock bands alive and kicking!

After a short break UFO hit the stage and for those (especially yours truly) hoping that the set list would be different this time, it became clear that it was the “good old” “Strangers in the night” set list again! So we could “enjoy” sing-along songs like “Only You Can Rock Me” or “Lights Out”, tracks I almost started to hate the last couple of years...

Best songs during the rather short set were “Love To Love” (Vinnie Moore playing like a young god) and “Rock bottom” (excellent improvisations by Vinnie again). Really disappointing was the sweet ballad “Baby Blue” (from the album “You are here”) and the two terrible encores “Doctor, Doctor” and “Shoot, Shoot”, songs that I absolutely cannot stand anymore! Why do they never play songs from “Walk On Water”, “Covenant” or “No place to run”?? Even from the new album Mogg and Co. only played two songs, which also sounded rather mediocre by the way.

Another thing that astonished me was the fact that Phil Mogg’s voice was not as it used to be. Is he getting too old for these gigs as he was taking a breather of at least 2 minutes after every track that he sang. The only true highlights of this evening were the guitar solos of Vinnie Moore and I would recommend UFO to change the set list the next time they come to play in Tilburg. Maybe then it will be a pleasure to visit a UFO gig again…

Review & photos by Martien Koolen.
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