Of the two opening bands, it was FURYON who were considerably more impressive than the rather pedestrian AIRRACE. The Brighton based band looked great and sounded just as good, it’s just a shame they were on so early tonight, which meant that a good half of the crowd failed to catch their set. Their music is hard rock, with a melodic edge, making them a great opening band for headliners WINGER. As for AIRRACE, their mediocre melodic rock didn’t hold enough punches to make up for their striking lack of image and swagger.

After a successful headline performance at Firefest 3 in 2006, it was only a matter of time before the reunited WINGER were back on British shores, and this time, it’s a full UK tour, and a chance to see the band up close and personal. Pigeon-holed in the hair metal and melodic rock categories, WINGER are a band who’ve had their fair share of ridicule over the years (Beavis and Butt-head springs to mind) but seem now to be getting the respect that the quality of their music deserves.

New album ‘Karma’ has received a good reception from the media, and songs like set opener ‘Pull Me Under’, and the excellent ‘Deal With Devil’ sounded great alongside the older material, and received just as good a reaction from the Dudley crowd. Highlights from the archive included the great sing-a-long anthem ‘Easy Come Easy Go’, and the brilliantly unique ‘Down Incognito’.

Kip Winger has aged well, and still looks healthy, and appears to enjoy being on stage. Alongside him, the awesome Reb Beach marches on, axe in hand. Beach, who also plays lead guitar with WHITESNAKE, is one hell of a player, and his guitar solos tonight were mesmerizing, particularly the solo on ‘Seventeen’ - probably WINGER’s most famous song.

With FURYON’s Alex Bowen filling in on the bass whilst Kip Winger took the keyboards, it was great to hear ‘Rainbow in the Rose’, ‘Headed For a Heartbreak’ and ‘Miles Away’ in all their glory, rather than acoustic renditions. The latter is one of the finest 80′s power ballads written, and was a real moment to pull out the cigarette lighters.

After wrestling with technical issues with bass guitar, WINGER ended the brief encore with the uplifting ‘Madalaine’, the song that opened their excellent debut album way back in 1988. 22 years on and it’s great to see WINGER still going strong, and still able to almost fill a venue the size of JB’s. I defy anyone to have gone home having not enjoyed the gig, it was definitely ‘Seventeen’ pounds well spent!

WINGER Setlist: Pull Me Under / Blind Revolution Mad / Easy Come Easy Go / Stone Cold Killer / Rainbow In The Rose / Down Incognito / Your Great Escape / Deal With The Devil / You Are The Saint, I Am The Sinner / Headed For a Heartbreak / Can’t Get Enuff / Seventeen / Miles Away / Madalaine

Photography by Alexander Shaw(Click Here)