The Jesus And Mary Chain might be opening an arena show, but they have no interest in behaving like an arena band. “Jamcod” pulses beneath green light, Jim and William Reid seemingly content to remain in the shadows, before “April Skies” and “Head On” bring the rock ’n’ roll, the latter driven by guitars and that trademark chorus.
“All Things Must Pass” has plenty of guitar too, but never at the expense of the tune. The slower “Some Candy Talking” is delivered in their customary lugubrious fashion, the band content to let the music speak for them.
Simone Marie Butler’s arrival changes the dynamic. “We can’t do it without her,” says Jim Reid before “Venal Joy”, and her harmonies add genuine power. “Blues From a Gun” is an early highlight, its swagger allied to an understatement that allows it to worm its way in, while “In a Hole” strips everything back to a simple punkish attack.
By “Cracking Up”, the contrast with the Hollywood Vampires could scarcely be starker. Perhaps not musically, but certainly in presentation. Yet “Between Planets” possesses fierce energy, and when Butler returns for “Sometimes Always”, she gives the song a completely different feel. Her presence adds something special to “Just Like Honey” too, although the band’s peculiar gift is that they compel without ever appearing to try.
Then “Reverence” provides the suitably dense, dark finale. “I wanna die just like JFK,” sings Reid as one final wall of sound fills the arena. Their strange, shadowy foray into arena rock is complete—and entirely on their own terms.
Hollywood Vampires sit where rock history, celebrity and a gig collide. Understatement is not invited. “I Want My Now” all but explodes as Alice Cooper demands exactly that – and are you going to argue with Coop? Thought not.
“Raise The Dead” lays out the personalities: Tommy Henriksen looks like a punk, Joe Perry remains the coolest man on earth and Johnny Depp appears to be auditioning for The Dogs D’Amour. Cooper then pulls out “I’m Eighteen” because it helps to have some of the greatest songs ever written as your own.
Yet “My Dead Drunk Friends” is the pivotal moment. Jazzy and dark, “we thought we were immortal, then we died” becomes both toast and epitaph: here’s to the ones who didn’t make it.
When Alice puts the hat on for “The Boogieman Surprise”, you know it is serious. Depp takes the darkly beguiling “Venus In Furs”, bondage imagery filling the screens, before “People Who Died” arrives with a punk sneer as lost stars flash behind them.
Perry adds exactly the right lip curl to Johnny Thunders’ “You Can’t Put Your Arms Around A Memory”, while “Who’s Laughing Now” starts with a bass solo as dry ice cascades across the stage. It is the final Vampires original. After that, covers all the way – but it helps when they are covers like these.
Cooper somehow makes Aerosmith’s “Livin’ On The Edge” sound more urgent. We are more on edge than we were 33 years ago, after all. “Baba O’Riley”, dedicated to “the court jester of rock ’n’ roll”, begins as a ragged acoustic thing, but this is not that sort of band. Soon it is ripping the roof off, topped by a drum solo.
Perry sings the 49-year-old “Bright Light Fright” while Alice parps on harmonica. “Beck’s Bolero” pays homage to Jeff Beck, with whom Depp toured before his death, and “Roadhouse Blues” goes out to one of Cooper’s old drinking buddies, its lyrics altered to name members of the 27 Club.
Credit to them for including Killing Joke’s “The Death And Resurrection Show”. Depp is back on vocals as it becomes a dark, heavy cacophony. From there, it is crowd-pleasers all the way: “Heroes”, for which Depp is surprisingly well suited; “Highway To Hell”, which fits Henriksen just as neatly; the magnificent “Walk This Way”; and “School’s Out” welded to “Another Brick In The Wall”. Once the white jacket appears, the giant balloons cannot be far behind.
The encore brings “The Train Kept A-Rollin’” and “Hi Ho Silver Lining”. Beck might have hated the latter; the Utilita Arena certainly doesn’t.
Would this many people fill an arena to watch this set without Alice Cooper, Johnny Depp and Joe Perry above the door? Probably not. But does that matter when punters have had this much fun and heard this many great songs? You decide. That is the whole point of Hollywood Vampires.
