Panic Room had originally intended a more extensive tour in November and December 2013. But the band’s decision not to book any further live dates until they had a new lead guitarist in place meant that they ended up putting the tour back until the new year, leaving the two already booked dates as their last live appear appearances of 2013.
The first of these took place in Shildon, a replacement for an earlier show in Darlington cancelled due to the unfortunate closure of the rock club. The replacement venue, Shildon Civic Hall is a typical modern multi-purpose arts centre, and despite the remote location still managed to attract enough of the faithful to make a decent crowd.
Laying out the hall with tables and chairs was probably a mistake. In theory the high stage should have meant people could stand at the front without blocking the views of those seated further back, but in practice it meant that almost everybody remained seated, which did rob the gig of a bit of energy.
Panic Room invited Winter in Eden, a band with a strong local following, to open the show, and by the number of t-shirts in evidence Winter in Eden’s fanbase swelled the crowd quite a bit. For those not familiar with their music, they could be described as “Nightwish with a British accent”, with a very impressive vocalist in Vicky Johnson, and more emphasis on lead guitar than many of the Euro symphonic metal acts.
Though marred slightly by poor sound (I thought they were a tad too loud), they put in a an energetic performance drawn heavily from their second album “Echoes of Betrayal”. The band have been in the studio recording their third album, and played one new number from it, sounding like an interesting progression of their sound.
For Panic Room fans the two big questions were “How was new guitarist?” and “What were the new songs like?”. After the departure of founding lead guitarist Paul Davies at the beginning of the year, the band played their spring tour with Morpheus Rising guitarist Pete Harwood standing in, who did a remarkably good job. This Shildon show marked the début of Adam O’Sullivan who joins as a permanent member of the band.
I think Adam made a good enough first impression. He’s still finding his feet to some extent, and probably needs a couple more gigs to grow into the role, but he’s clearly got the chops to do the guitar parts justice. He takes an interestingly different approach on some of the newer material, with volume-control atmospherics. One thing I noticed was he doesn’t play slide at all, which makes some older numbers, such as the cover of “Bitches Chrystal” sound a little different.
As for the new songs, they played no less than five numbers from the forthcoming album “Incarnate” due for release early in the new year. It’s difficult to judge new material on one listen, given Panic Room’s sophisticated and layered sound, but all five new songs sounded good, and they don’t sound like retreads of things the band have done before either. There are some classic Anne-Marie soaring melodies, some out-and-out rock, and some interestingly different arrangements that seem a step back from the wall-of-sound approach of SKIN.
Panic Room’s final gig of 2013 is their annual pre-Christmas show at The Robin 2 in Bilston on December 1st.
Chantel fronts a classic blues-rock power trio. Opening with one of her most hard rocking tracks, “Caught Out”, Chantel played an intense guitar-shredding set, mixing songs from her album “Like No Other” with extended guitar workouts, including her lengthy cover of Robin Trower’s “Daydream”, finally finishing with a very heavy version of the instrumental end section of Yes’ “Starship Trooper”. With two talented sidesmen her band play an awful lot of notes for three people, and one hour went very, very quickly. She deserves to have won over a lot of new fans with that performance.
The set is much the same as they’ve been playing all year, with a greater emphasis on the hard rock side of their music than on their atmospheric epics. Olivia is singing lead a greater proportion of the time, much of it on newer songs written for her voice such as the Nightwish-like “Unquiet Tears” and the emotive closing epic “Questioning Eyes”. They’ve got the pacing right too; a high spot was “Never the Rainbow”, “Deep In Borrowdale” and “Nowhere to Hide” in quick succession raising the energy levels in the second half of the set. 
 The support band was Exeter’s The Computers. Ever had a band’s name and looks sets up expectations of how they will sound, then see them proceed to nuke those expectations? The Computers did precisely that. They came on stage in suits and skinny ties, leading you to think they’d be some kind of 80s new-wave revivalists. But from the moment they struck up the opening notes of “Bring Me The Head Of A Hipster” it became clear they were something very different.
Like many acts of their vintage, The Damned are down to a couple of original members in the shape of lead singer Dave Vanian and guitarist Captain Sensible, supporting by three much newer and younger-looking recruits. Their greatest hits set featured numbers right across their career. They played oldies from the punk years like “New Rose” and “Smash it Up” alongside the later goth-psychdelia of “Grimly Fiendish” and an excellent cover of Love’s “Alone Again Or”, even though they avoided their 17-minute prog-rock epic “Curtain Call” (Bah!). Despite Dave Vanian being the only constant factor in the band’s lineup over the years, Captain Sensible seems take have taken on the role of band leader and effective frontman. It was The Captain who did most of the song introductions, and it was his guitar playing that dominated the sound, with more than enough soloing to please any classic rock fan, even on the punkier songs.
