Doro

Doro
Date : 09/20/09
Place : Key Club, West Hollywood CA
Review By ~Aniruddh (Andrew) Bansal

Doro hit the stage at 10.15 with the opening song Earthshaker Rock. It was a thrill for me to see the metal queen from the first row!! This is what I love about club shows. You can get up close to the stage and it's a very intimate setting where everyone is involved in the show and not 100 miles away in nosebleed seats.

Doro Pesch got the crowd shouting 'Hey! Hey! Hey!' as the band continued with the next song I Rule The Ruins. The title song off of the first Warlock album Burning The Witches was played next. It was a great sing-along and everyone in the crowd seemed to be really getting into the show with this song. Another title song from another great album, True As Steel was next.

The show was only 4 songs old and it was an amazing night already. After this they played my favorite song off of the latest album Fear No Evil, the song named Night of the Warlock. Fight for Rock followed and as Doro said before playing it, this one was for the head bangers!
Doro showed how amazing her voice is with the next song Above The Ashes. She has a really good vocal range and its no wonder at all that she is one of the most respected female singers out there. Its hard to believe that she has been around for 25 years now. Another one of my favorite Doro songs of all time Unholy Love came next. I honestly can't think of any way of complaining about this set list! They played everything I would ever want to hear from the Warlock and Doro discography. A fast one, Metal Racer followed this song after which Johnny Dee showed his prowess on those drums with his drum solo.

The drum solo led into the easy sing along We Are The Metalheads. After the awesome Hellbound, it was time for a tribute. Doro said 'We would like to do a song by a band who I would love to thank for giving me the opportunity to come to America for the first time many years back'. And the song was Breaking the Law. First they did their own slow version of the first verse with just keyboards and vocals, then the whole band kicked in with the proper version. It goes without saying that I loved every minute of that! Doro was allowing a lot of people in the front row to participate in singing the various chorus parts of all the songs, specially this one. I got to do the 'O-O-O' during the middle of Breaking The Law when the intro riff is repeated. It was thrilling to say the least! They did a few more fun sing along songs before closing the main set with You're My Family. They came back out for the encore and it was 4 songs long, much to the delight of everyone present!

Doro Pesch gave such an amazing performance. Her voice was amazing. She was able to get the whole crowd to participate and sing. She was very gracious, thanking the crowd on various occasions between songs. She even received roses on the stage from a few people had come from places like Mexico, Australia and Russia just to see the show! I am thankful for the fact that metal acts like hers from Germany aren't too well known in this country, because it allowed for an intimate and fun-filled club setting. Its never the same at huge arena shows. The crowd interaction was truly amazing. It felt like everyone is contributing to make the show a success. The other members of the band can't be ignored. Long time member Nick Douglas was great and energetic on the bass. Luca on the keyboards did his bit, so did Bas Maas the new guitarist who was in After Forever before joining Doro. Johnny Dee was awesome as well. Doro said that they will be back in the States in February and I can't wait to see her band again. She was nice enough to remain on stage after the set and oblige the fans by signing autographs. All in all it was a memorable night. Fun times!!

Here's the complete set list in correct order:

1. Earthshaker Rock
2. I Rule The Ruins
3. Burning The Witches
4. True As Steel
5. Night Of The Warlock
6. Fight For Rock
7. Above The Ashes
8. Unholy Love
9. Metal Racer
10. Drum Solo
11. We Are The Metalheads
12. Hellbound
13. Breaking The Law
14. All We Are
15. Burn It Up
16. You're My Family
17. Fight
18. Celebrate
19. Love Me In Black
20. Fur Immer