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Buckcherry w/ Nonpoint and Failure Anthem at Braun's Concert Cove - Akron, New York

by Infinite Devil Machine

Show Review- Back in July, the day after July 4th, I decided to celebrate America's independence by getting super messed up and heading to Akron, NY - about a 45 drive from my home with a good buddy of mine to catch show headlined by everyone's favorite band, Buck-F'n-Cherry.

Yep, the band most famous for, of all things, writing an earworm in the form of "Crazy Bitch" that's still covered by every hacky bar band to this day and for ripping off a "classic" Kiss song for their own hack-tastic ode to drugs, drinking and debauchery in the form of "Lit Up".

This one was gonna hurt. But hey, for $20 a ticket, I was more than willing to suffer through it.

Showing up just a little late, to the little hole in the middle of space and time (if you turn too far sideways and squint, Braun's Concert Cove looks like a cactus sitting in the middle of an empty, dusty field.) Braun's location, nestled conveniently between a Denny's, a truck stop, and a truck stop with another Denny's in it, made for a great lowbrow setting for a lowbrow band like Buckcherry.

Upon arriving, as said, we managed to catch the end of the show's first opening act, a band called Failure Anthem. They managed to be both pretty good and utterly forgettable. Thankfully, playing a couple of their bigger "hits" "Paralyzed" and "First World Problems" it became clear that this band wasn't one of the many, many "screamo"/"metalcore" bands polluting the opening act slot of way, way too many mid-sized shows like this. The singer sounded good and intelligible, which is more than you can say for most singers in a lot of "doomed to be openers forever" bands you see at a lot of shows these days. I'd probably pay to see these guys again, on their own. And that's more than I can say for most bands of this ilk.

Upon Failure Anthem warming up the crowd from a deep freeze to a mild thaw, Nonpoint took the stage with their rallying cry "Generation Idiot" from their newest album "The Poison Red". It was here that the audience really started wearing on my buddy and I. I may have forgot to mention, but this was indeed a Tuesday show. The dreaded Tuesday show. Full of older folks, a good amount of them old enough to be my parents. Obviously, Buckcherry brings to mind the exploits of Poison and the hair-metal glam bullshit bands of old. And that was who showed up. The men and women whose fashions haven't evolved past the leather and jeans and now (unfortunately in most cases) too damn low tops on the now more than "robust" sized 80's rocker chicks, with enough hair spray to burn a hole in the ozone layer. And they were dead. Dead as a doorknob for Nonpoint's set. As the California-based quintet tried to hammer out their biggest and best songs, running through "Miracle", and a couple more tunes from "The Poison Red"- "Standing In The Flesh", and "Divided...Conquer Them", Nonpoint finally got the sedate crew, straight out of the old folk's home, moving a little bit with one of their most recognizable hits from their previous album "The Return", hammering out a scintillating rendition of their anti-drug addiction song (definitely at odds with Buckcherry's very pro-drug use style) "Breaking Skin" before running through their classic cover of Phil Collin's "In The Air Tonight", and finally turning the clock back all the way to 2001 with their last song (and the only damn song to get a sing-along from the audience) "Bullet With A Name".

Above all, I'd probably give Nonpoint's set a better rating if the audience hadn't felt like they'd been being kept awake with a sharp pointy stick and being propped up like cardboard standees in a grocery store. They were still good, but Nonpoint might not be a "big" enough band to cross the line and make a Tuesday crowd at a hole-in-the-universe poo hole care about their stuff. I'd love to catch them again with a better, bigger, and livelier crowd.

During the interminable wait for Buckcherry, my buddy and I decided to check out Buckcherry's merch table. After eating some amazing, and I mean amazing, lobster meat mac 'n' cheese and drinking my, eh, probably 7th double Jack And Coke of the night, I bought Nonpoint's show-used drumsticks, a poster, their CD, Failure Anthem's CD, Buckcherry's CD, and had a chance to fondle (but not buy, even I have standards) a Buckcherry branded d*ldo.

Finally, and seemingly out of nowhere, seriously there was no fanfare - Buckcherry kicked in with their Kiss rip-off song "Lit Up". And, with the crowd as thin (well, in terms of attendance anyway, some of the heffers in the place could have given enough beef to keep a McDonald's running for a year) I managed to scoot right up to the stage and lean my elbows on it. Partially to get closer to the action and partially because I had about seven double Jack and Cokes, six beers, and two Double Jagerbombs through the course of the night and knuckle-bump Josh Todd, Buckcherry's Gremlin-man hybrid of a singer. Running through a bunch of their hits, including "Whiskey In The Morning", "Bring It On Back", and "Next 2 You", Buckcherry finally hit on "Out Of Line" and their "ballad" "Sorry". "Sorry", is, in my mind, one of Buckcherry's good songs. Its a pretty lovely slow jam that actually managed to get a nice sing-along out of the audience, who, even up until this point, still looked like they were fit to be stuffed. Kicking back into things, Buckcherry tore the place open with "Get With It" off of their newest album "Rock And Roll" and "Slammin'" an old-school tune from Buckcherry's second album "Time Bomb" before running straight into "Tight Pants" and "Gluttony", both solid hits from Buckcherry's newest albums. "Carousel" and "Crazy Bitch", from their most famous album "15" ended the main set. After a quick break, Buckcherry hit the stage again for a couple encore tunes - "Say F*ck It" a cover by the band Icona Pop and "Too Drunk..." an early days hit replaced by a cover of Deep Purple's "Highway Star" on the album's eventual wide release.

Above all, I'd give Buckcherry's set a solid and big old "eh". For the $20 I paid, and given all the booze I consumed, I had a good enough time. I went more for Nonpoint, and Buckcherry, despite being the headliners, were just an afterthought. Basically, they played all their big hits and called it a night. I can't complain too much.

Overall, I'll say old people kinda suck. Aging hair-metal fans don't age gracefully and Buckcherry are, for better or worse, the perfect kind of lowbrow, bullshit throwback to that style that those people dig. But, for $20 and enough booze to submerge the Trump Marina, I'll say I dug it and had a pretty good time. To be honest, in this case, the extracurricular, between the bands shit was the most fun part of the gig.

On an added note, while waiting for a ride, my buddy and I met Nonpoint's guitar player in the bar and he hooked us up with an autograph. Great dude from a great band. Class act all around.

Call it a, eh, 6/10. For all the 80's rocker chicks in the place who might have been 10's in their days and are 6's (with some beer bottle goggles and at a glance) now.

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