Kee Marcello @ The Robin, Bilston, Wolverhampton - 22nd September 2016

Review by Woody

One of the successes of this year’s HRH AOR was Kane’d who got one of the best reactions of the weekend and won a whole host of new fans. They may have been an unknown to most of the audience at the time but Kane’d have been knocking about a while and as a fan of these guys it’s really pleasing, they are getting such positive reactions and are hopefully on the rise to bigger and better things. They are hard at work on their third album which I’ll be anxiously awaiting to hear next year.

They are hardened live act and are no stranger to small pub venues but have the confidence to perform and entertain on larger stages – just like they did at HRH AOR! Obviously, a venue like the Robin gives the band more room to move and helps give the band a better stage and sound to showcase their songs on than many of the smaller venues they have played in the past.

Fronted by three sisters all on lead vocals not only gives the band an awesome vocal harmony arsenal but also makes them a little different to most bands you see and gives them an entertaining edge that many bands lack. Steph, Stacey and Chez all interact with the crowd equally and have a really engrossing stage presence and more importantly these three very attractive ladies have stunning voices.

They have a very melodic sound, but they have more of a metal edge than rock and that shines through in the guitar riffs and heavy backing provided by the rest of the band. They came across really well at The Robin, the sound was heavy but those lush melodies still shone through perfectly most noticeably on the ball tickling awesome chorus on ‘Beautiful But Tragic’. They are a great live act and not only recreate their songs faultlessly they are insanely fun and do a great job of getting the audience involved and up for it!

Their set flew by and it felt really short I really hope next year the band can get a few headline shows going in my neck of the woods! We also got the fun time party song ‘Wasted’, ‘Rise’, ‘She’s Got You Now’ and ‘La Di Da’. If these Welsh rockers are coming through your town do yourself a favour get yourself dolled up and down the front with a beer in hand and ENJOY!

Kee Marcello is a name I know well due to his time with primetime Europe and his tenure with cult rockers Easy Action, but I don’t know much about his solo albums and I’ve never seen him live before – Obviously with him playing The Robin it was the best time to pop my Kee cherry! Obviously as a guitarist his post Europe work tends to be more guitar heavy and harder hitting than the slick and smooth rock of heyday Europe. The set tonight reflects that and although there is a healthy dose of Europe classics in the mix it is a heavy rock performance from the melodic rock legend.

Joining Kee on guitar is Kane’d guitarist Harry Scott Elliott who if you didn’t know better you would think was a full-time member of Kee’s solo band, he fits in so naturally. I got to appreciate Elliott’s immense guitar skills a lot clearer during this set than I did with Kane’d, I don’t know why but I think I get more distracted by other members of that band *Cough* to fully appreciate his abilities.

Kee has a new album out soon and he plays a couple of tracks from it peppered throughout his set like opener ‘Black Hole Sun’, ‘Soldier Down’ and the title track ‘Scaling Up’. He did stick to the rockier tracks but I would have loved to have heard the old school melodic rock flavoured ‘Don’t Miss You Much’ and ‘Fix Me’ but admittedly they have my have been too soft to fit into the energy of this set.

Kee is a solid performer whose stage presence just screams ‘I’ve been there and done that’ and he has that level of confidence on stage that only comes from years in the biz. He’s not an overly active performer and his vocals may be a little rough around the edges, but that only adds to the heavier aspect of his solo songs.

Obviously, the Europe classics sound a little darker and heavier but the crowd tonight don’t seem to care and they turn into sing-alongs with the crowd helping Kee out on those famous choruses to the likes of ‘Superstitious’, ‘Rock The Night’ and ‘More Than Meets The Eye’ and the inevitable encore ‘The Final Countdown’. Kee didn’t neglect his older solo albums and I have to admit not all of these songs really appealed to me and it did make the first half of his set a little less exciting for me. The others in the crowd seemed to enjoy them far more though so are obviously veteran supporters of the man as they appreciated ‘Highway’, ‘EMD’, ‘Starlight Sky’ and ‘Dog Eat Dog’.

One of the highlights of the evening was the airing of Kee’s Easy Action tune ‘We Go Rockin’ which goes down a treat and I really enjoyed it. Kee does have a quick jab at Poison who nicked the song and slightly adjusted it to make their big hit ‘I Want Action’.

If you’re a melodic rock fan seeing Kee at least once should be on your list of gigs to see, he’s a solid performer with a back catalogue of songs to wet your pants over and what better way to hear those Europe classics in more intimate venues than a Kee solo show!