Venue: The Victoria, Fletcher Road, Stoke
Other Acts: Fighting Flux, Rain, All Over Now and Shouting
Swift on the heels of the Memorial at Denry's, we hotfooted it to The Victoria in Stoke for the Semi-Finals of The Band of the Land competition 2011.
First up were Fighting Flux, who apparently since the 1st heat have had a line-up change. An interesting bunch, with a ukelele player!! Playing mainly rock based sounds. The guitarist, a young lad called Taylor, was clearly the main force behind the band espescially when he pulled out his twin neck guitar!!!!
Rain were up second, a half hour set Louise told us, so we mixed things up, doing Fever and Know on Bass, followed by the other tracks. good reaction from the crowd too...
All Over Now and Shouting were up last... at which point Graeme and I thought we should pack our bags and go. They are incredibly techinically proficient, and while a metal band, with a female singer and the growling vocals reminiscent of Korn, we thought they were clearly the winners...
However... the judges made their decision... Rain were to go through to the Final... on one point!!!
Diversity.
OMG!!!! We were in shock!!
Apparently they have had so many metal bands in the competition, it really put the judges off, and they were pleased that there was something different!!
AOKaS had a band meeting, and think that words were said, then the head judge announced that AOKaS would be entered into the final as well... seeing as they have a female vocalist as well, she thought it fair.
Have to admit, while the idea of judges decisions being final.. we are probably the oldest people in the competition and have very little by the way of milage... the youngsters have their youth, plus amazing technical ability... I do think its important for judges to stand by their decisions.. and if it upsets a bunch of teenagers, then they have to learn that they can't win everything.. and there is a lot to be said for losing, as it can mean that they'll try harder for what they want... had they been to the X=Factor.. I'm sure Simon Cowell would just tell them to grow up and stop being petulant! lol
Considering that we
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