By Anthony Bromberg
Daily Bruin Senior Staff
Nobody may ever accuse Gavin Rossdale of being the greatest
frontman in rock n’ roll. He may not be the most charismatic, his
guitars solos may not be categorized as virtuosic, he may be the
best looking, but one thing is for sure ““ Rossdale knows
exactly how to satisfy his fans. This consists of putting himself
in all of his waifish greasy rock star glory front and center. A
lot.
With their face and voice man working overtime Bush rocked the
Universal Amphitheater Saturday night. The audience ate up their
grungy guitar riffs and wailing vocals. Bush played material
spanning their four studio album releases, with an emphasis on hits
and leaving the audience happy.
Looking around the amphitheater it’s easy to realize a lot has
changed since "Glycerine" was unavoidable on the radio. Rossdale’s
girlfriend is now a bigger star than him and the name Bush is once
again more associated with a goofy president than a rock band.
Bush’s own bald and pleasant guitarist Nigel was nowhere to be seen
and the left side of the stage was filled by someone with hair
even, but Bush’s core and apparently still numerous audience has
stayed essentially the same. Intensely infatuated girls and guys
who like hard rock (thankfully, without even a little rap).
These people, young and old, filled Universal, save the balcony,
and were extremely responsive. The room was dark and slightly musty
as the band went on. The smell of pot filled the air as waves of
loud guitar, drum, and vocal noises emerged from the stage. And
from the get go (continuing through the encore) girls were
shrieking ravenously, everyone was cheering and clapping (also
constantly), and most people were singing along.
Visually the two highlights of the show were Rossdale and the
lighting arrangements. The lights alternated from twirling
colorfully to shining out onto the audience to spotlighting the
band and the large screen behind them on which was projected words
and images associated with or tangentially related to the songs.
The coolest light effect, though, was when during a particularly
frenetic guitar part the lights started to shake, melding the
audience’s audio and visual consciousness quite skillfully.
Rossdale shook too, and shook a lot. He threw his hips around
like he was going to have them replaced tomorrow. He came out into
the audience and let the fans fawn up close as he sang. He grinded
with his guitar slash phallic symbol so as get all the girls’ blood
running. And most impressively he pulled out a spinning move on
several occasions that was warmly reminiscent of a schizophrenic
bum in Fresno who used to walk/spin down streets for blocks as he
listened to his headphones plugged into nothing ““ if said bum
had been British, gorgeous, and playing a guitar that is.
Musically, the concert started on a low note as opening act
Default could have passed for early era Creed ““ remember
before Creed realized that mellowing their songs out and pretending
to be Jesus garnered automatic multi-platinum sales. So, yes ladies
and gentleman, Default was Pearl Jam styling without strength at
least twice removed for anyone who is counting. Even the kids in
the pit seemed bored during this uneventful set.
Bush, on the other hand, had the audience eating out of the palm
of its hand as soon as they came on stage. Audience reception was
still most positive for the earliest Bush songs from "Sixteen
Stone" and "Razorblade Suitcase," while songs like "Comedown" and
"Swallowed" provided the band with the slow fast song structure and
guitar versus Rossdale’s voice that they play best with. After
playing a 10 plus song set, the British lads came out for a five
song encore, pulling out all the stops. This included a solid
version of "Glycerine" that started with just Rossdale and a guitar
and halfway through the whole band kicked in. Also, in the most
surprising and perhaps exciting moment of the night after
"Swallowed" some familiar chords struck up on the guitar, but they
weren’t Bush chords, and no it wasn’t Prince and the Revolution
either, it was a rocking fun version of The Cars "Just What I
Needed," which with its upbeat tempo was a refreshing and
appropriate choice amongst Bush’s own more sombre compositions.
After the Cars cover Bush ended the show with an impassioned
"Little Things," thanking the audience and declaring Los Angeles a
great place to end the first leg of their tour.