Michael Monroe - Glasgow Garage - 27/11/11

I'm standing watching Crash Diet and all I can think is that this must be what Steel Panther must be like if you removed the punchline from their jokes.
I can barely make out a word the singer is squealing at us and when I can it sounds like he is saying something about the children of the night.
It seems that originality is not on the menu this evening.
The singer has all of Billy Idol's moves choreographed to perfection and he also sports a rather magnificent mohican that looks as if it was stolen from the set of the Mad Max movie Beyond the Thunderdome, but while that may sound rather promising there's something about the performance that's more pantomime dame than glam punk.
In fact do you remember Wrathchild?
Well Crash Diet could be the result of a gang bang that they were involved in way back in the early eighties.
Unfortunately the talent, no matter how meagre it was, that Wrathchild had wasn't passed down to their bastard offspring.
I personally don't get what they are doing.
It's like an inside joke that no one is letting me in on.
Some will say that's my loss, but if this is the shape of things to come in the world of glam rock then I doubt I'll be dipping my toe in to check the temperature.
Thankfully it wasn't long until Michael Monroe and his band took to the stage and showed why they have just been awarded album of the year from 'Classic Rock' magazine with a set that most would call a master class in how to promote rock and roll to an audience.
With Steve Conte, Dregen, Sami Yaffa and Karl Rockfist backing him up Michael has quite possibly the fiercest rocknroll band on the planet as his brothers in arms.
They're simply on fire.
Michael moves like Iggy Pop on amphetamine laced steroids. He's a blur who spit out the lyrics with a passion that men a fraction of his age couldn't manage, and he does it every night.
It's all sort of mind blowing to me.
Meanwhile his band are all smiles and clearly enjoying feeding off each others beats, riffs and solos. Everything they do sounds organic and the power that is being expelled from them could probably light up a city if it was captured.
This is the real lightning in a bottle deal, and it's as loud as a thunder to.
It's the Rolling Stones, MC5, Little Richard, The Stooges, The Who, The Sex Pistols and the Ramones all rolled into one and channelled through sheer force of will and personality out into the audience.
The performance is a force of nature.
The set itself features more material from Sensory Overdrive than it did when they steam rolled through town before, but still manages to find space to fit in a smattering of Hanoi Rocks, Demolition 23 and Michael Monroe songs that the hardcore fans would consider unforgivable if dropped.
The surprise addition of an impromptu funked up jam on Aerosmith's Walk This Way during the introduction of the band members was one of those 'you had to be there' moments.
It sounded more like the Chilli Peppers than anything that Tyler and Perry could come up with and provided an ample example to anyone who doubted it that this is a band with the chops to do just about anything they wanted to.
Is anyone getting what I am saying here.
I'm saying that right at this moment in time I don't think there's another band that come close to touching these guys .
Okay. While I'll freely admit that my heart sank a little when Ginger Wildheart left the band I've got to say that Dregen is just as perfect a foil for Steve Conte to play with, and Sami seems to have found an onstage partner in crime as Dregen duck walks around him and throws his guitar all over the place.
All is well and everything is still on track.
This is the third time I've seen Michael Monroe in this year alone and it just keeps getting better and better, and once the left the stage the night was over for me.
For me it's simply a case that no one can follow these guys and as I've seen Wednesday 13 a few times before I knew that I would find his performance to be an anticlimactic end to the evening.
So after a quick hello and goodbye to Steve and Sami, who were proving themselves to be more than willing to get down and meet the fans, it was time to head across the road to Nice and Sleazys for some liquid refreshments and make plans for the Steve Conte and the Crazy Truth gig that will be coming to the Soundhaus in Glasgow on the 6th of December.
With some luck I might even squeeze in the Quireboys before that.
I think that two days will allow me enough time to come down from the high and the buzzing in my ears to abate.
Then I'll be ready to do it all again.
See ya down the front.