Just after the halfway point of their set, Dirty Honey have at every other show they’d played on this tour, done a cover of Prince’s “Let’s Go Crazy”. Tonight as singer Marc LaBelle informs us, they intend to change things up. The way they do this is by adding a cover of Aerosmith’s “Last Child”.
It’s at that moment, that it hits you. And you realise just how much like Steven Tyler and the boys Dirty Honey sound.
The LA-based quartet might have arrived on stage with “Rock’n’roll Damnation” from AC/DC blasting out of the speakers but this is a much more Joe Perry based swagger.
They are here, for the first time in the second city, on the back of their fantastic album “Can’t Find The Brakes”. They begin with its title track, But Dirty Honey have always been impressive as they prove with “California Dreamin’” from their debut album.
They play the trippy a “Little Bit High”, which has plenty in common with The Black Crowes, but sees LaBelle joining in with the percussion before an Eastern-flavoured jam. Guitarist John Notto is every inch the gunslinger, and his riffs on the likes of “Dirty Mind” and the Guns N Roses-tinged “Tied Up” add some real filthy rock’n’roll.
They are a tremendously skilled outfit, and really could be anything they want to be as “Coming Home {Ballad Of The Shire)” proves with its Allman Brothers-esque acoustic balladry, which both gives a change of gear and ushers in a hoedown, country style take on “Honky Tonk Woman”.
It’s not that the sound is ground-breaking – even LaBelle acknowledges this when he says: “this one’s about a fucked up relationship, what else is new?” before they play “The Wire”, it’s more that Dirty Honey are just is so very good at this. The frontman carries it brilliantly. on “Another Last Time”, which owes a debt to its heroes he ends up playing the song from on the bar.
And they look like rock stars. There is no mistaking these boys are in a rock’n’roll band, LaBelle clad in a jumpsuit with a tie around his neck, in particular looks like he was born to do exactly what he’s doing right now. Yet he may not be enjoying it as much as normal, as he requests that the company that owns the venue “sink some money into the vibe” and the odd technical glitch hinders the flow slightly.
“When I’m Gone” ends the set, but of course rock stars like these are going to be back for encore, and both “Won’t Take Me Alive” and “Rolin’ 7’s” which includes solos for each of the band including drummer Jaydon Bean and bassist Justin Smolian are both worthy of closing the evening.
But it is something that LaBelle said towards the end which sticks with you as you leave. “What do you say” he’d asked the crowd if we come back and see you again real soon?” When they do, I am willing to bet it will be in venues as big as the one Simple Plan were playing next door. The room is packed, which considering they’ve never been to Birmingham before perhaps explains the buzz around the band. And nothing that happened in the hour and a half they were on stage has changed my mind as to what I believed when I walked through the door: quite simply, the old guard, the Aerosmith’s of this world, if you like, are not going on forever and Dirty Honey are the future of rock’n’roll.
