Poison with Lita Ford and Grimsley Rose
Appalachian Wireless Arena
Pikesville, KY
July 9, 2022
Review by James Stamper / Images by Tom Biggs TRB Photography
July 9, 2022, was a night Eastern Kentucky will never forget! Pikeville, KY received a “dose” of Poison, along with Lita Ford and Kentucky’s own, Grimsley Rose. If this tremendous lineup doesn’t catch your attention, I don’t know what will! If you’re into the 80’s hard rock scene, driving fast cars, partying all night until the sun comes up, with two bottles of alcohol in one hand, a girl in the other, and a Marlboro red in your mouth, then this show was for you! Pikeville received a crash course on how the 1980s partied and let me be the first to tell you, everyone absolutely loved it! The Appalachian Wireless Arena was not quiet for one split second! There were points it was so loud, you couldn’t even hear yourself think!! But that’s what concerts are all about! Great music, super drinks, and an amazing rock n roll family gathered to bang heads!
Let’s dive into the details of this splendid rock n roll show!
First on the bill is Grimsley Rose. Hailing from the Lexington/Richmond area of Kentucky, I expected nothing more than a heavy, hard-hitting rock n roll band, and that is exactly what I received! Starting out the set, was “Save Your Soul”. Automatically, I felt the electricity go through my body. Metallica has a song titled “Ride The Lighting”, which was what I was doing throughout Grimsley Rose’s set! Then comes “Tomorrow Wakes A Fool”. I’m in awe! How have I never listened to this band before? “My gosh”, I was thinking to myself! How can a band be this good?
But wait, just when I thought it couldn’t get any better, here comes the track, “Wasting My Time”. This one stood out to me personally. Shoutout to Sirius XM’s Octane, this is a song you need to pick up!! The melody is flawless, along with the face-melting guitar playing, the heaviness of the bass, and lastly, the thunderous drums! An all-around perfect song and one that I hope Grimsley Rose never stops playing live! Throughout the whole show, my eyes kept gravitating towards a certain individual in Grimsley Rose. One guy who I’m very familiar with and who I’ve seen play many times live. That individual is no other than “The Beast”, Trey Bledsoe! Good grief! The amount of fury Trey puts into those skins! I’m pretty sure I saw a couple of drumheads go flying!! But to wrap it up, Grimsley Rose is worth seeing and I would highly recommend that you do see them! I guarantee you 100% that you’ll leave a fan! Trey, Todd, Keith, and Bo all know how to rock!
Next up on the bill, is none other than Lita Ford. Lita has had a stunning career being with the Runaways in the 1970s and then, a very successful solo career in the 1980s and onward. I saw Lita once in Corbin, KY in 2016, but I needed a refresher on just how much she can rock! Opening with “Gotta Let Go” I immediately went crazy! This is one of my favorite Lita Ford songs, so if this was the start, I knew I was going to be in for a roller coaster of rock n roll! Pikeville loved Lita and wasn’t afraid to show it!
Lita wasn’t going to come lightly, bringing a supergroup with her to blow the roof off the Appalachian Wireless Arena! Lita Ford – guitar, vocals, Patrick Kennison – guitar, vocals, Marten Andersson – bass, and the legendary Bobby Rock on drums (look up Vinnie Vincent Invasion and Nelson)! Lita decided to blast out her big hit “Hungry” and Pikeville really enjoyed that! I felt like and imagined I had time traveled to the 1980s. I could only imagine what it was like to be a teenager then, seeing this for the first time!
Switching out guitars often, Lita Ford has quite the collection of B.C. Rich guitars. She brought out the big double neck and here came the song everyone was waiting to hear, “Close My Eyes Forever”. I give props to Patrick for doing an outstanding job on Ozzy Osbourne’s part! If you closed your eyes and listened, I promise you wouldn’t know the difference! It was that close! Lita closed her set with what I consider to be one, if not her biggest hit, “Kiss Me Deadly”. As many times as I’ve heard that song, I never get tired of it. It’s a stone-cold classic and always will be! So happy I got to see Lita Ford again and I hope it won’t be the last! You rock, Lita!
Now, the main attraction, Poison, was ready to bring the stage down to the ground! Hailing from Mechanicsburg, PA, Poison fit right in with the scene going on in Los Angeles, CA on Sunset Boulevard. Hanging with bands such as Motley Crue, Ratt, L.A. Guns, W.A.S.P., and Guns N Roses, Poison would be known as one of the greatest 1980’s hard rock bands of all time.
Starting out their set with “Look What The Cat Dragged In”, Pikeville literally blew up! No one was sitting down! The whole arena was jumping up and down! Everyone was so excited to see this band perform!! Not to mention, Poison is all original, so that made it even better! Bret Michaels, CC Deville, Bobby Dall, and Rikki Rockett were about to show Pikeville what rock n roll was all about, Poison style!! Afterward, they jumped into “Ride the Wind”, which I’m a big fan of! Now, when I heard a drum intro and the bass going, I knew I was about to hear “Unskinny Bop”. Oh wow, did that get the crowd roaring!
I was still in awe after Grimsley Rose and Lita Ford, but gee oh, what a show Poison was putting on! In this next part, I give a lot of respect to Bret Michaels for doing what he did. He asked everyone to light up the arena with their cell phones or lighters and dedicated the song “Something to Believe In” to all the veterans in the arena and around the world. Very cool! I was impressed. Poison hadn’t lost their touch. They sounded like they did back in the 1980s. It’s like you put one of Poison’s records on the sound system of the Arena and hit play! That’s how amazing they sounded!
CC Deville gave a guitar solo, and Rikki Rockett gave a drum solo, both sounding prominent! We’re entering the final stages of the concert and here it is, the song Pikeville had been waiting to hear… the song that made Poison, Poison. Bret grabs an acoustic guitar and starts strumming “Every Rose Has Its Thorn”. In past reviews, I’ve talked about how loud crowds have been. Forget I even stated about that, this was the loudest crowd I’ve ever heard in all my times going to concerts. The girls screaming, goodness! However, I do love the song and love the way they performed it! Poison gave an encore with “Nothin’ But a Good Time” and left Pikeville with melted flesh laying everywhere! That is how Poison does a show. They come in, steal your heart, melt your face and leave. Excellent. Hope to see them again! Get out and see Poison or any live show for that matter! Let’s keep live shows going!!
Grimsley Rose:
Lita Ford:
Poison:
