Gods Festival 2003

Line Up: Jeff Scott Soto - Vocals , Marcel Jacob - Bass , Howie Simon and Freddie Akesson - Guitars, Jamie Borger - Drums

I have been to a lot of concerts in my day, and have seen a whole lot of great players and in fact, until Talisman came on I thought my group Tamplin played pretty well. Well let me tell you, it's 3 days later and my ass still hurts from the musical whipping I got last Sunday at The Gods. You know there's good, and then there's great. Talisman was great. A great rock band.

I thought it funny that by definition, the name Talisman means a charm or amulet that is magical and produces extraordinary results. Yep, that just about sums up their show. Jeff Scott Soto sang his ass off. I didn't hear a missed note (and I was looking/listening). He just has the frontman thing down! He grooves like a soul brutha. I must say that an audience that has just heard more music than maybe should be allowed over the course of two days, Jeff took the crowd, put them in the palm of his hand, and instead of flaunting that power in arrogance and strutting away with it, he gave it back to them with class. Just simply a great front man.

The guitars were rediculously great. Howie Simon and Fredrik Akesson on guitar make a deadly duo.

It's kinda like having Yngwie, Uli Roth and Michael Schenker on stage all at the same time. From blistering leads, to tasty european melodic solos. Exceptional guitar playing all the way around.

Even Marcel Jacob played a bass solo that you didn't immediately run for the consession stand 'till it was over. He played a very tasty tapping and arpegio bit with just the right amount of distortion on his bass that Billy Sheehan would have appreciated.

No exageration folks. Down to Jamie Borger who entertained with his stick twirling, while laying down rock solid grooves.

They played some of the old, some of the new, they even broke into a version of Seal's "Crazy" (which by the way I've heard Seal do live and in my opnion, Jeff did a better job)

After the second encore (and possibly getting a call from Sharon Osborne to help out with the next Ozzie tour after she heard Howie Simon and Fredrik Akesson) it was time to go home.