Until tonight I didn’t know a lot about Burning Witches. I knew they were all female, and I knew most of them were very tall as I once shared a lift with them (don’t ask!) but in terms of their musical output? Nada. In my head they looked a bit like Vixen so I was kind of expecting some lightweight froth rock. Nope. These girls have come to us from the Doro School of Rock. The music is hard and fast, the attitude is in-yer-face party and the outfits involve a lot of lycra, leather and studs. Their songs are anthemic power-metal, with one called ‘We stand As One’ that particularly stood out for me. There’s a lot of Maiden-inspired twin guitar, there’s an insistent rhythm and there are infectious, punch-the-air choruses. Much to my surprise, I loved it. Yes it was a bit cliched, but at the same time it was performed well and had me nodding along all the way through.  

As for Paul Di’Anno, well I certainly know a fair bit about him. It’s been a while since I last encountered him in a live setting though. Well, nearly a lifetime actually – 42 years. Wow. We are both older, fatter and less mobile than those heady days of 15-year-old me getting thrown out of a Maiden gig at my local pub for being underage in the summer of 1979! Paul’s ongoing health issues mean he is currently still in a wheelchair, although he hopes to be doing more physical therapy once this current tour finishes. So his movement may be a bit curtailed, but his sharp humour and rather stunning voice have lost little in those long long intervening years. He’s assembled a cracking band for this tour, and the set is essentially a trip back down memory lane to the early Iron Maiden days for those of us who were there, and a little slice of rock history for those too young to remember. The bass player goes straight into Harris Foot mode as they belt out ‘Wrathchild’, but how can he not in the circumstances? I wasn’t sure what to expect here, it could have been like watching a rather sad tribute act but I’m pleased to say it wasn’t, at all. It was more like stepping back in time. The old songs still sound fresh and new, and for you Maiden purists I was able to pick out ‘Sanctuary’, ‘Remember Tomorrow’, ‘Murders In The Rue Morgue’, ‘Phantom Of The Opera’ and even ‘Transylvania’, which I thought was an odd choice. If you’re the original singer in the band, choosing one of their instrumental songs seems a bit weird, but hey-ho, it was performed flawlessly and we all got to headbang along like the old days. Pass the ibruprofen! They finished, as I hoped, with ‘Running Free’ which to this day is my favourite Maiden song, and Paul left the stage to an appreciative roar. To borrow a football vernacular, the boy done good. It was an excellent set done by a bloke who's determined to keep getting out there and doing his thing against some quite considerable odds at the moment. 

KK's Priest then. KK came out of retirement a couple of years ago when he joined Ross The Boss of Manowar on stage at Bloodstock for a couple of numbers, and he seems to have well and truly embraced his renaissance since then. A word first about the stage, the Ritz is not the most massive of venues but somehow they have managed to fit a split-level platform complete with giant video screens onto it. The platform isn’t just a drum riser, it’s a proper extra stage space that the whole band make use of for posing purposes throughout the set- impressive. They are introduced by a giant demon on the massive screen and then boom, well over an hour of face-melting high-energy proper Metal. It’s all a bit OTT ,but at the same time that’s Rock N Roll, right? The second guitarist is like a younger version of KK, with flowing blond locks and a series of flying V guitars. Vocals are provided by Tim “Ripper” Owens, perhaps the only man in the world who would willingly have a go at out-Halfording Halford and actually pull it off. I'm less familiar with the songs than I thought; I was honestly expecting it to be a set of Judas Priest classics but that isn't what happened at all.

The Judas Priest songs that are aired are deep cuts rather than the “hits” so we hear Ripper (of course), ‘Green Manalishi’, ‘Changes’, and ‘Beyond The Realms Of Death’ as well as the more obvious ‘Breaking The Law’. The rest of the set is filled with the band’s own songs as they have released 2 albums now. The songs are very much of a kind, the titles are what you expect (‘Reap The Whirlwind’, ‘Sermons of the Sinner’, ‘Brothers On The Road’, ‘Hell Patrol,’ ‘Metal Meltdown’) and the stye is very Priest-like. Still good though. Mr Ripper has an incredible voice, and uses it to full effect all night. I note that rather than KK taking all the glory the solos are split pretty much 50-50 and there is just the occasional bit of synchronised lifting of guitar necks, which makes me smile. Musically it's all spot on and note perfect. In fact it becomes obvious as the night goes on that this is not just a random collection of jobbing musicians surrounding a “name”, this is an actual band who interact well with each other, bounce off each other and appear to be having a fantastic time up there on the stage.

Again there's a lot of metal cliches here but let's be honest KK invented some of them so he's allowed! The encore is ‘Raise Your Fist’ and then ‘Strike Of The Viper’, and again I am surprised and heartened that they don’t rely on the Priest legacy. They have the panache and talent to go forward with something new, and despite KK being something of a Granddaddy of Rock they really showed us that there’s life in the old dog yet.  

Check the “In The Flesh” page for more photos!
KK’s Priest,, Paul Di'Anno, Burning Witches