On Friday, June 14, Eric and I saw Warrant, FireHouse and the Bulletboys at the Rose Music Center in Huber Heights, Ohio. Huber is just north of Dayton.
We were in the back row of the pit, dead center, so great seats. It was warm but not oppressive and people were in a good mood. A Friday night with live music and great weather? What’s not to love, right?
Bulletboys performed first. They are basically Marq Torien’s solo act these days with so many fill-in members, but that’s fine. They sounded good. The set was very short at 30 minutes. Like always, Marq did his little jigs around stage while wearing his sequin tops. By the time they were done with their set, the crowd started to really fill in. They played at 7:30 on the dot and that is kind of early for a rock show. We were walking through the gates when they started so we didn’t really miss much.
The highlight of the show for me was seeing singer Nate Peck front FireHouse. The kid is 23 and I know him from American Idol. He’s been fronting FireHouse for months now, and he’s the permanent guy after CJ Snare’s untimely death.
Peck did a really great job and can sure hit the high notes. I will say he needs to watch out and not get too screamy, but he was giving it his all and there was no phoning it in. As a self-proclaimed hair metal fanatic, the kid was definitely living his best life.
The best moment in the FireHouse set was the tribute to CJ during the song “Home Is Where The Heart Is.” There was a nice video montage of CJ and then a video of him performing the song back in the day in Japan. During this part, Nate discreetly left the stage and let CJ have the spotlight. Very classy.
Warrant came out sounding a little funny I have to say. I think the audio was better for FireHouse but it was eventually fixed for Warrant by about the third or fourth song. At the midpoint of Warrant, a woman two rows in front of me puked. Imagine spending so much money on concert booze that you need to puke and then have to leave the show you paid to see. Crazy.
Shortly after the puking incident (which freaked Eric out because he has a vomit phobia called emetophobia and thus could no longer look in that direction of the stage) a woman behind us in the first raised row popped over to give us a hug and tell us we were awesome for being at a show for music we didn’t know. I was like “Huh?” and she thought we were too young to know the bands! Eric and I got a good laugh out of that one. She was drunk too, though.
Warrant of course ended their set with “Cherry Pie” and Nate Peck was standing on the side of the stage. Singer Robert Mason invited him on out to sing and Nate shared a mic with Joey Allen. Again, the kid was all smiles. This made me smile.
Also can I say that Robert Mason looks absolutely ripped these days? He has always been fit, but my goodness, boy is looking crazy these days. Abs! This wasn’t my show but the setlist is the same:
Sunday, June 23, 2024 at 12:30PM