U.D.O. Brings North American Tour To A Fitting End In Los Angeles

By Andrew Bansal

April 23rd 2013, Whisky A Go Go, Hollywood CA: After a gap of 12 years, U.D.O., the band headed by original Accept vocalist Udo Dirkschneider, embarked on a short North American touring run on April 9th and played the last show of this tour at the Whisky A Go Go in Hollywood last night. Because of the fact that Udo hadn’t visited this part of the world with his solo band for such a long time, specially Los Angeles, it was the first ever live Udo experience for a large section of the crowd, myself included. With the current lineup of Accept going strong with what they’re doing, I wasn’t sure about how well this show would do, but not only was the turnout great, people were genuinely excited to see the original voice of one of the greatest heavy metal bands of all time.

The band was scheduled to hit the stage at 10.30 PM, and I entered the venue around 15 minutes prior to that. As expected, the crowd started pouring in to approach the front to get a closer look at Udo and the gang. The anticipation and anxiety amongst these fans started growing, and the band eventually appeared at 10.50. Opening with a song off of a brand new unreleased album can be tricky at the best of times, but such was the instant impact of ‘Steelhammer’, the title song of the next U.D.O. album, that it worked pretty much perfectly. The loud, heavy, simple music easily resonated across the concert hall and the even simpler one-word chorus got everyone singing with fists raised high.

From then on, the band brought out songs carefully selected from the U.D.O. discography, including one more Steelhammer song ‘Metal Machine’, and songs from the Animal House, Mean Machine, Timebomb, Man And Machine, Thunderball, Mission No. X and Dominator albums. So I would say they were able to give us a fairly good representation of the U.D.O. catalog. Of course, as a fan you can never be completely satisfied with a band’s set list, but for the most part this set went down excellently well amongst all fans. And besides, they did pull out five gems from the old Accept albums, much to the thrill of everyone present at the Whisky last night.

The main set consisted of the Accept classics ‘Screaming For A Love-Bite’ off of the Metal Heart album and ‘Head Over Heels’ from Balls To The Wall. The sheer old-school awesomeness of these tunes was clearly felt by this crowd as their energy and excitement level kept rising by the minute. Being in the front row I felt a strong push from behind but things never went out of control and people were generally having a good time without getting in each other’s way. Other than the Accept and U.D.O. tunes, both guitarists got their own guitar solo time too, which was a good addition to the set as it gave people a chance to notice the musicianship of somebody other than Udo for a change, and it was also time for a breather, time for a short break from all the non-stop head-banging, fist-pumping and singing.

Even after being subjected to such a thunderous 16-song main set, we all definitely wanted a little bit more from the band, and they sure delivered with a very special Accept encore, the holy trinity of the songs ‘Metal Heart’, ‘Balls To The Wall’ and ‘Fast As A Shark’. When it comes to encores, that’s about as good as you will ever get at a metal show. It was simply fantastic. I support the current Accept lineup 100 per cent, but to see the real versions of those Accept classics sung by the original voice which was one of the main reasons for growing up to love those very songs, it was totally the real deal and we were in metal heaven.

All in all, a truly memorable night, and having previously seen Dickinson, Dio and Halford, I feel like I’m now a step closer to completing the list of the greatest metal vocalists I’ve seen, after this breathtaking live Udo experience. It’s really amazing how great he still sounds. He hasn’t lost any of the 80s magic, at all. His band will be back to the States early-ish next year, so if you missed this tour you should certainly check it out next time, for now I know that you can’t ever go wrong by attending an U.D.O. show. Horns Up! \m/

[Live photos by Ronnie Lyon]

Related: Interview with Udo Dirkschneider | Full Photo Gallery

Set List:
1. Steelhammer
2. Rev-Raptor
3. They Want War
4. Metal Machine
5. Leatherhead
6. Screaming For A Love-Bite (Accept cover)
7.  Vendetta
8. Head Over Heels (Accept cover)
9. Guitar Solo – Kasperi
10.Burning Heat
11.Man And Machine
12.24/7
13.Guitar Solo – Andrey
14.Animal House
15.Break The Rules
16.Timebomb

Encore:
17.Metal Heart (Accept cover)
18.Balls To The Wall (Accept cover)
19.Fast As A Shark (Accept cover)

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