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Fresh off the back of opening for Slash in various parts of the world and Deep Purple, RavenEye have been all over the UK on a lengthy spell, due to end early next week. Making inaugural performance in Edinburgh, I can’t think of a better venue than Bannermans, the sweltering heat making up for the blustery and wet weather of the evening. Having had the chance to see them with Blues Pills last year, I jumped at the opportunity to see the trio once more.
Opening the proceedings were three-piece Crossfire. Rattling through half a dozen or so songs of blues and boogie-laden hard rock, singer Tam Slavin admitted the band “don’t do ballads” but did the tempo for a couple of numbers, sounding akin to ZZ Top at their finest. One notable song was entitled “Paradise Hotel”, its crunching and wailing melodies sounding much like “Paradise City”. However, with such a tight performance and no song falling on deaf ears, they nicely warmed up the crowd with their incredibly tight performance, setting a great mood for the night.
Next up were Jed Potts and the Hillman Hunters. Taking a far more bluesy route, it was great to have two support bands each take to one extreme of RavenEye’s core musical makeup. Being my first time seeing them, I was thoroughly impressed. Mixing a blend of covers with instrumentals, Jed and his band didn’t waste much time chatting, focusing on hammering through the set, at times playing so frenetically, Jed’s strumming hand was a complete blur. It was a great change of pace between the hard rock of Crossfire and the gritty, bluesy version offered by the night’s headliner. Well played, Bannermans.
After the second and final changeover, the third three-piece of the night made their mark, effortlessly. Bursting with energy and at no point straining themselves or exaggerating matters for the intimate venue, RavenEye were out to prove opening for Slash, Deep Purple (and in coming months) Hellfest shows the calibre of their music and thusly their musicianship.
Throwing things a little left-field, the band start with an unfamiliar song before immediately hitting the familiar notes of the aptly-named “Get It Started”, then taking us back into the wilderness of various songs which will hopefully appear on an album at some point. Sadly, I never caught the names of many of them but if you’ve heard the Breaking Out EP or have seen the trio in action before, it’s RavenEye at their finest.
Like their predecessors, singer and guitarist Oli Brown doesn’t waste much time chatting with the crowd, intent on letting the music speak for itself. Which it certainly does. Combining Oli’s bluesy, gritty hard rock riffs with Aaron Spiers’ thrumming and frantic bass lines and Kev Hickman’s solid pounding of his drumkit with the passion and energy of a band with twice as many musicians. Their energy and passionate performance makes the unfamiliar material instantly enjoyable.
Rounding out the end of the set was the more familiar songs of the singalong “Hey Hey Yeah”, “Breaking Out” and “You Got It”, complete with Oli perched atop Aaron and wandering into the crowd before splitting and playing their guitar and bass respectively amongst the crowd. And then Oli decided to venture out on his own for another round of antics, grabbing the beer bottle of the person next to me for an impromptu session of slide guitar.
With their final bow taken, the three lads jump off stage and mingle with the crowd. Chats with Oli and Kev reveal they have a lot of material sorted for an album and hopefully their time in Scotland next time won’t be quite so brief. So when they make the journey back, I’ll be there once again.
RavenEye: official | facebook | twitter | instagram | youtube | tumblr | soundcloud
Jed Potts and the Hillman Hunters: facebook | reverbnation | bandcamp
