Critical Bill @ Emerald Theater 8/9/07
Critical Bill Live @ The Emerald Theater 8/9/07
Hot Damn! What a wild night in The Clem last night as 
Critical Bill stormed the Emerald for a Hot Summer night of kick ass Rock & Roll from these boys who call The Clem home. That’s right, Mt Clemens own Critical Bill returned home last night to headline their own “Detroit Democracy” contest show, that puts the winner in the opening slot for Critical Bill’s upcoming fall “Free America Tour”. After weeks of 5 prelim rounds @ 5 different clubs throughout the area, each club declared a winner via audience ballots. Those 5 winners played tonight, where each person in attendance was again given a ballot at the door to cast their vote. The winner of tonight’s contest will pretty much receive a “free ride” while on tour opening for Critical Bill. As Powerdise told us “we’ve been doing this for a while now, and have put a lot of work into it, and now we’ve gotten to a point where we can give a little back. There’s a lot of talent around here and we want to give everybody a chance to see it. ”
We arrived at the Emerald as The Unheard were loading in, getting ready for their set. So as the story goes, we missed Lithium, Hatch, & Liquid Reality. Oh well, our show schedule has been getting quite hectic as of late, (thanks for all the request to be at your shows!) as we’ve been hitting up an average of 3-4 shows a week! Needless to say, we just can’t be everywhere, every time, but we will continue to do our best! As the Unheard was setting up, Schimdog from 60 Second Crush came over to say hi and fill us in on their new line-up changes. Ryan has informed us that yes, 60 Second Crush has found their new guitar player to fill the void left by Jason Caine’s departure. He is none other than one Dave Hicks from Monroe! They’ve been rushing to work him in as they have some Gig’s this weekend. Hope all goes well for this explosive group!
When The Unheard took the stage @ 10 o’clock, the emerald 
exploded as Ken Allen walked out to the roaring crowd. It was apparent that The Unheard were well repped tonight! The Unheard delivered a tight set as usual, hitting on all cylinders with bassist Chris Biddle, drummer Gino Canale, and guitarists Steve Zornes and Wally Filipiak supplying the heavy back beat that vocalist Kenny Allen fed off of. Giving their fans what they wanted, The Unheard cranked out Helpless, No Attention, Let Me Go, while finishing with a rousing rendition of G-N-R’s Paradise City. Afterwards, talking with Allen, the guys were quite bummed about not winning the Gig, but also thankful that they got this far before finishing as close as they did! Check these guys out @ www.myspace.com/theunheard, they really do rock!
BWNN is one we had never seen before tonight, and they certainly did rock the house! Again a strong showing from all the BWNN fans as they swarmed the front as the band hit the Stage. An alt rock band, they reminded me a little of Linkin Park as Justin Hackman (keys) came out from behind his behemoth keys to back Jeff Gutt (vox). Rounding out this dynamic 5 pc is Gary Pittel (guitar), Mike Guy (bass) and Keith Ottenbaucher (drums). Fighting the “animal like” crowd to get a closer look, our timing couldn’t of been any better as BWNN launched into their rabid tune AnimalLike! Whoa, the crew & I were swept into the ensuing frenzy at the front of the stage, as the BWNN fans showed their support. Reach these guys on myspace @ http://www.myspace.com/e78 to hear their stuff.
Back @ the Dr2 table, we ran into John Massey, bassist for the rock outfit Soul Circus. Have to thank the guys from Soul Circus, who without their help, the Poets And Pornstars show, along with the Operator show over @ Club 54 would not of been pulled off! Great job guys. Falling upon a little luck, one of the crew recognized one of these big guys standing watch over the back stage entrance, which in turn gave Dr2 a chance to talk up Powerdise from Critical Bill. Kind of cool, as we came to the conclusion, that we both love the local scene around town these days, and are amazed at the amount of talent here. Powerdise, explained that this is why Critical Bill was back in town tonight, looking to reach out a hand for another local talent. Even got an invite to the after party over @ Crazy Eights, that’s another story all in itself, so we’ll let the pictures do the talking on that!
Critical Bill comes out at you with both fists blazing, as they opened the night with their hot tune “This Is Critical”! As Critical Bill drew heavily from it's latest "313", they had the Emerald a shaking, as the boy’s from The Cleme proceeded to shred the theater apart. From that point on it was pure mayhem, as they blasted through a tight set that featured Powerdise patrolling the entire stage, while alternating between ear splitting rhymes and earth shaking “melodies”. The Theater seemed to really enjoy that “Get High” tune if you know what I mean! Bringing things to a climax, Powerdise, hand selected a couple dozen of the female fans to join them on stage for the final of the night “Jump Around”. Jump they did, 
as the whole front floor was in the air, fist raised to the sky, as Critical Bill ripped apart what little there was left of the Emerald. As the set ended, Critical Bill gathered at the front of the stage to announce the winner of the Detroit Democracy Contest as Hatch! What an Excellent Show! Their new album “Downtown The World” is set to drop September 18th on Westwood Records. Check them out @ www.critical-bill.com.