Sansara/Silverlith/Bad Magic/Armourgeddon

Champions, Bournemouth

With the temperature outside dipping below -5 degrees, most sensible people are at home in the warm, however tonight rock fans have a great incentive to leave their central heated homes to venture down to Champions, Sansara a great new rock band from Bournemouth with a host of promising supports.

First up is “Armourgeddon” a tribute act to the work of the late great Ronnie James Dio, the four piece power through a great 30 minute set showing great respect to their idol with quality versions of “Holy Diver”, “Rainbow In The Dark” and Black Sabbath’s “Heaven & Hell”.

The drummer who was sporting a nice mullet Mohican haircut was situated at the centre of the stage with a huge kit built around frame work giving the rest of the band very little room to move around the stage. The band left the stage to some decent appreciation mostly from the older members of the audience.

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“Bad Magic” really get the party started by delivering a top class set from a band who even at this young age really know how to entertain in a big way. The lead singer, the Vivacious Chris Payn, seems to have been to the School of Rock as everything expected of a front man he has in copious amounts. When the audience stay by the bar for the 1st few numbers, Chris does a great job in cohearsing people away and on the dance floor. Apart from a popular cover of AC/DC’s “Whole Lotta Rosie” the bands set comprises of their own material which really impresses with their heavy twin guitar Rock sound that packs a real punch. The band have a great chemistry between the four of them and seem to really enjoy what they are doing, if they continue to put in performances such as this anything is possible, next up for them in a place in the Quarter Final of the Dorset Music Awards where they will surely progress further.

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Local Bournemouth band “Silverlith” take to the stage with lots of confidence, however they struggle to follow the passion and energy of “Bad Magic”, their punchy basslines and expert guitar work make for a great original alternative rock sound, with their own self written songs “Don’t Count On Me” and “Dark One” sounding really impressive. As great as the music was the bands interaction with the audience was minimal with most of the audience moving away from the dance floor back to the bar.

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So on to the headliners “Sansara”, they hit the stage with by far the loudest sound of the night and the interested audience once again crowded around to the stage to once again be entertained and entertained they certainly were. The band have a sound that embraces the Seattle grunge of the 90’s combined with influences from more modern rock acts such as Alter Bridge and Nickelback. The five piece band deliver a near perfect set full of some great intricate guitar rifts from lead guitarist Sam Hughes along with some excellent vocal skills from singer Tom Sawyer. The band seemed to perform better the longer they stayed on stage, this must have been due to all the positive enthusiastic encouragement that they gained from audience.

They left the stage as worthy headliners, there was plenty of shouts for an encore, but the venue has reached it’s curfew time and the people would have to wait for a next time. A great evening with four really impressive band who just prove the rock music scene in Bournemouth is really alive and actually doing quite well.

Set Lists
Sansara
Pacified Moody
How Do You Get By
On My Way
Halo
Down
Torn Between Lives
More Than This

Silverlith
Death By Default
RHM
Apologies
So What
Don’t Count On Me
Best Intentions
Dark One.

Bad Magic
Loaded Gun
Get Out Of My Head
Number 1
I Hear You Calling
Roadkill
The Swing
Whole Lotta Rosie
Raise It One More Time
Light It Up

Videos
Sansara