On Wednesday May 14th, Piere’s hosted a show with Tantric, Fosterchild and Framing Hanley, it was a bit of a departure from what I have been seeing at Piere’s. What was the difference? The bands were more or less all about the music, not much into the light shows or the histrionics of most shows that I have recently seen. Now here’s the cool part, the crowd got into what they were seeing and rocked out to the show.

One thing you notice about Tantric from the get go, is the fact that these are some seriously talented musicians in the group, whether it be Kevin Miller on drums, Erik Leonhardt on bass, Joe Pessia on guitar and Marcus Ratzeboeck on violin...yes, Violin. Of course you can’t forget to mention vocalist Hugo Ferreira, the one original of the band that was the...oh, you know the story Days of the New fans! Anyway, back to what was rocking that night, “Lucky One” was a song that caught my ear to its hooks and also the killer guitar solo that split the song from one half to another.

Something that also caught my ears throughout the night was the fact that the band almost was like a jazz band that does rock songs. Maybe that sounds like a negative or a huge compliment (depending on your thoughts of Jazz) but the point is that there was always something going on throughout the show and it didn’t really look like it was just for “show”, something more than that. Little fills here and there, that kind of thing on the guitar, bass or drums can be quite cool and that is how Tantric did it all night.

“Down and Out” which is a new track of the newest Tantric CD, “The End Begins”, had a nice twist to it, a little violin intro/solo to start off the song that was quite cool, along with some very solid rhythm from the bass and drums, this made for one of the more enjoyable songs of the night. “The One”, also off the new CD, was a very solid song to rock out too.

Now to my question...”Let it Be”? Whoa! That was a song that I never expected to here live, but the boys from Tantric decided to rock the song out. I imagine the guys from Tantric realize that they are stepping on holy ground when it comes to a song like that from the Beatles, so I don’t have to criticize it, but I must say that it didn’t really feel right when compared to the rest to the nights work. It wasn’t a bad rendition, as a matter of fact, the crowd seemed to be enjoying themselves to it...oh, did I mention that this was a huge crowd for any night, Wednesday though? The listeners appreciated the rock show.

“Hunger Strike”, yes, that “Hunger Strike” from the one and done Temple of the Dog super group, was the next song of the night and this song did sound right. It was nice to here the vocals by Hugo and from Fosterchild’s Danny Beissel, this song worked far better in my mind than “Let it Be” did..felt more natural. Closing out the night was the song that started it all for Tantric, “Breakdown”, which if you are listening to the radio right now, you might hear it...very popular rock song that translates very well as a live song. The crowd had every lyric memorized and shouted them out for the band to feed off of, great way to close out a show.

Fosterchild is a rock band out of Philly, a band that is made up of veterans of other rock bands that have made the scene and some serious success too. One thing that was crazy to see was Brian Quinn looking all 80’s with the hair and bandana and rocking out on the guitar all night like it was something he could do in his sleep...the dude was amazing to watch all night. Songs to check out would include “Bulletproof”, “Crucify” and “Independence Day”. Their time on stage included an amazing cover of “Immigrant Song” by Led Zeppelin, which rocks out like a four star rock show when played from your car stereo, never mind hearing it done live by a band with a very active PA system kicking that song into overdrive. Fun times my friends.

The opener for the night was Framing Hanley, a band that I’d like to here more of coming out of the show. While their sound seemed to be a bit muted, the guitar work by the band was stellar, the vocals were strong and the rhythm section was solid. I am not sure how big this band will get, but they seem to have a sound that might just be really strong on CD.

Gotta run, more to see! More to listen to...Rob Thompson