dad_2012_03

» D-A-D 2012 03 11

Reviewed by Tobbe
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Special guest: The Floor Is Made Of Lava
City: Stockholm, Sweden
Venue: Cirkus
Date: 11 March 2012
D-A-D set length: 107 minutes

D-A-D

Sunday night in Stockholm and Danish quartet D-A-D returns with their latest release DIC.NII.LAN.DAFT.ERD.ARK. An album I rated as high as 9/10 this past fall, so without a doubt I was hoping for loads of music from it. Tonight's gig is located in an old wonderful circular venue with great atmosphere and usually the sound quality is awesome in this theater.

This show starts without set decoration, except for a backdrop with the band logo from above mentioned album, making this feel very low budget and since the ceiling is rather tall, it felt very hollow up on stage. Luckily, with lead singer and rhythm guitarist Jesper Binzer's stage presence, bassist Stigge Nasty's escapades and his almost constant changes of funny looking bassguitars, Laust Sonne's magnificent jazz-style drumming and the feeling of lead guitarist Jakob Binzer's play, half is already won. So when their longhorned bull is raised from behind the drum kit after approximately twenty minutes, I have already forgotten my initial feelings.

Tonight's show holds no surprises when looking at their setlist, as a total of six new songs are played, a bunch of old songs and almost no songs from the middle of their career. A very common way to choose songs, which makes it rather plain when seeing bands on many tours through the years. The band got to somehow please the masses though, as they know that their hardcore fans will return anyway. This is significant when radiohits Bad Craziness and Sleeping My Day Away are played, as the whole venue suddenly turns into a cheerful place.

Extended versions, with either long solos, jams, guitar duels or sing-a-longs, is something that D-A-D are frequently playing. I counted to five or six songs that were several minutes longer than when recorded and this splits me. On one hand they do it good or even great, but on the other hand they could have added a couple of songs during the set instead. Faster songs as heavy and fiery Reconstrucdead as well as fantastic and angry monster Evil Twin are played right afterwards extended songs and this tells me that they want the crowd to wake up again. During new single I Want What She's Got, which was played as a rock version of that semi popsong, Sonne's drum kit lifts ninety degrees into the air and to perform in that position takes some impressive skills, but seemed like a walk in the park for him.

Laugh 'N' A 1/2 and It's After Dark closes the set. The first is played solely by the Binzer brothers and is much appreciated. The latter is a great closer with massive singing from the crowd and one of two songs where Stigge is doing the main part of the lead vocals; the other one being cool country rock'n'roll song Riding With Sue. A performance worth 6 chalices. A good gig, but nothing extraordinary and with a somewhat lame crowd. I'm sure this band sees no end and they will be back with full force as long as they cut down on their long solos and jams.

Performance: 6 chalices of 10
Stage sound: 8 chalices of 10
Best: Evil Twin and It's After Dark
Worst: Monster Philosophy

Setlist:

Intro
A New Age Moving In
Jihad
The End
Everything Glows
Point Of View
Monster Philosophy
Reconstrucdead
Riding With Sue
Last Time In Neverland
Grow Or Pay
We All Fall Down
I Want What She's Got
Evil Twin
Bad Craziness
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The Place Of The Heart
Sleeping My Day Away
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Laugh 'N' A 1/2
It's After Dark
Outro