Gig 20030426 Journal

Source: Shihad.com (circa 03)

Date Published: Unsure

Who: Shihad.

Where: Festival Park (98 ROCK Livestock) - Zephyrhills, FL

When: 26 April 2003

Reviewed by: Shihad (Karl Kippenberger)

Last night we drove from Maimi to Zephyrhills (just out of Tampa) and were hit by monsoon proportions rain, thunder and lightning. The lightning alone was amazing, it would fork across the sky and light up the whole area, Jules had his camera ready to try and capture the acts of mother nature. Unfortunately it never looks as good as the real thing. eventually we got to the motel and chilled before sleepy bye-byes. Woke up early to get to the feastival and found out we were playing earlier than scheduled. oh well, there's always gonna be a drama at these rock'n'roll festivals. We hit the stage close to midday and their was already thousands of people getting shit-faced, wanting to be rocked. what a crazy crowd, their was slam-pits galore and girls in barely bikini's. The crowd for us was pretty responsive for all 25 minutes of our set. I had a bit of a hard time cause i had bashed my riffing hand in miami, so it had swelled with a bruise. Plus my sans amp pedal and leads had gone missing. It made the beginning of "My Minds Sedate" not as evil as it usually is. Still Rock was the winner of the day. We were still tired from the last few days so we loaded up and headed back for the motel to chill. Tom, Jules and I headed back to the Festival at about 6:30pm to see Def Leppard, yes thats right, you heard me right... DEF LEPPARD, the music i lost my virginity to all those years ago. We headed out to the mixing desk and got a perfect view. WOW, they were amazing, the played the first side of "High and Dry", "Photograph", Foolin'" and "Rock of Ages" off "Pyromania". "Hysteria", "Women", "Animal", "Armageddon It", "Rocket" and of course "Pour some sugar" off "Hysteria", plus a couple of new songs i didn't know. For a bunch of guys that must be nearing 50yrs old they rocked it like youngin's. The sound was huge and the crowd lapped it up with every song, there was alot of girls on shoulders flashing boobs, just like the old days. It was one of the more rockin time warps i've seen. I still cant believe i've seen Def Leppard live, even after three days i still have their songs in my head. x karl