Rival Sons & Clutch
The Wiltern – Los Angeles, CA
Tuesday, October 8th, 2024
Review/Pics: Manuel Gay
Clutch and Rival Sons joined forces and embarked on the Two-Headed Beast co-headline tour at the beginning of September. After a little over a month on the road together, they stopped by the magnificent Wiltern Theater on October 8th. As I walked-in I was informed that Black Stone Cherry who was supposed to open the show had to drop last minute due to unforeseen circumstances. Comedian and podcaster Dean Delray responded to the Rival Sons last minute call to fill in for them.
Scott Holiday (Rival Sons’ guitarist) showed up to briefly update the crowd and introduce his good friend Dean. The Let There Be Talk podcast host opened by saying it wasn’t his first time around opening for a rock band. He actually had done it more than a couple of times, including opening for Metallica and a few other names. And he stated right away that it never goes well, because people are here for the music, nobody cares for the jokes. However, within the twenty minutes he stayed on stage he most definitely got a good laugh out of all of us and did a great job at warming up the crowd. He had a few killer stories, notably one about attending an Elton John concert with a friend who was high on mushrooms. Before leaving, he shared that he had just shot a special that will be coming out on Netflix. I will make sure to check it out, and so should you.
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The two bands have been alternating throughout the tour who plays first and who closes the night. On Tuesday night Clutch came out first. The Maryland band celebrated the twentieth anniversary of their classic album Blast Tyrant (2004) so they announced that they will play the whole album and a few more songs. I particularly enjoyed personal favorites “Ghost” and “Regulator” for which Neil Fallon took on the lead guitar duty.
A good portion of the crowd were rocking Clutch merch, so they felt right at home. Other than Jean-Paul on drums taking a solo, the musicians stayed in the back pretty much the entire time. It left room for Neil to walk around the stage. I had never seen them live and loved his stage energy. He gesticulates throughout the show and his facial expressions are amazing, as if he was living the stories he sung out to us.
Eventually the band played songs from other albums, which they had a lot to choose from since their catalog is so large. Indeed, they played the banger “Slaughter Beach” from their thirteenth and most recent album Sunrise On Slaughter Beach (2022). They closed their set with “Electric Warrior” and gave Dean Delrey a shoutout for filling up for Black Stone Cherry.
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At 9:45pm, the lights were dimmed again, and it was time for Rival Sons’ Jay Buchanan to kick off things alone on stage with an acoustic take of “Shooting Stars” that allowed him to demonstrate quickly his unbelievable vocal abilities. Jay might be the best singer I’ve been lucky to see perform a few times. I’d rather inform you that my objectivity was already out the window at that point in the show.
I had read somewhere that Rival Sons might be playing “Great Western Valkyrie” front to back like Clutch, as the album turned ten in 2024. It would have been fine by me as it was the record that introduced me to the band, but they ended up playing somewhat of a “greatest hits” setlist which was perfect. There were however a majority of more recent songs from their two 2023 albums Darkfighter and Lightbringer. The band originally from Long Beach, CA knows how to work a crowd and improvise just like when Scott’s acoustic guitar’s mic was off, and Jay pointed his microphone at the guitar to keep things going.
Other than being great musicians, the band also always offer nice visual show, with amazing outfits and light effects. Jay wore a black suit but remained bare foot for the whole show, for example. The band served us a few crowd pleasers “Electric Man” and “Too Bad” which were amazing and then treated us with an extended version of “Feral Roots” before closing with “Keep On Swinging”. They kept the energy high all night and left everybody in the audience beyond satisfied.
Rival Sons is a band I’m pretty much sure to catch live anytime the opportunity presents itself and I am glad I finally got to see Clutch live. Although I enjoyed the Tyrant Blast set, I would love to see them again with a more varied setlist.
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