Remove the safety catch
The former Guns & Roses and current Velvet Revolver bassist Duff McKagen switches instruments to take on guitar and vocals for his long term side project Loaded. Not surprisingly they bring a little sunset strip sleaze to Download but lace it all with a healthy dose of punk rock attitude.
The sound is great and it suits their high energy rock and roll perfectly. Early on I have to say it comes across as fairly typical LA fayre albeit very well done and tight. ‘Sleaze Factory’ and ‘Dark Days’ deliver the kind of straight up rock riffs that you might expect and they do sound a little dated in places, even more so when they give us Duff‘s G&R number ‘So Fine‘, very of it’s time.
Mid way through a fair number of the sizeable crowd head off to see Motley Crue and subsequently miss the best parts of the set! First up is a solid cover of the Misfit’s ‘Attitude’, followed by an equally solid version of the Stooges ‘ I Wanna Be Your Dog’, that is until it degenerates into rather pointless (& not very good) guitar canoodling. Just as I think they’re in danger of losing it however they pull the ace out of the hat, first of all teasing the crowd with the opening few bars of the intro for Guns & Roses ‘Welcome to the Jungle’, then playing the first verse of ‘Paradise City’, which in turn breaks down into ‘It’s So Easy’, for which they are joined on vocals by Corey Taylor from Slipknot. Taylor really goes for it and it’s a great climax to a decent set, which when taken at face value has been nothing but entertaining and enjoyable.