Okay...I thought I would begin my Dog* connection with a review of the concert from our local idiotic paper "The Buffalo News." (you can tell that I really *love* our paper. I'm surprised that they reviewed the concert, since there has been other big concerts here and they never reviewed those -- Like The Barenaked Ladies, for example.)
I would also like to say that there is a mistake in the paper (everyone here will be able to pick it out.) The writer quoted the Badfinger cover as a composition of Bret's. NOT!!!!!!!! Unless Bret was really talented at the age of 2 and changed his name from Pete Ham to Bret Domrose :D I don't think he wrote this song. I'm going to write the paper about this -- they usually don't fact checkers on reviews. :-\
This reviewer was paying more attention to the crowd than the music or the concert which is a total bummer!!!!
Here goes....
Keanu's night in the limelight dims the music
by Rafer Guzman -- News Staff Reviewer (no picture included)
Not since Sting has a bass player inspired such fervor among women. At the Dogstar concert Tuesday at the Ogden Street Concert Hall, women outnumbered men by about 10 to 1 -- and they were dressed to impress. Most of them wore their lowest tops and their highest bottoms.
Eyeing the scantily clad crowd, the lead singer of the local band Velour wondered aloud, "Are you all waiting for -- Keanu?" Highpitched screams greeted the mere mention of the name. Later, the house DJ tried the same trick -- "Are you ladies ready for the 'SPEED' man?" -- with equally successful results.
Even Silverjet, whose new-wavey guitar rock received the kind of applause usually reserved for headlining bands, couldn't resist a comment on the Keanu mania. "If only the guys knew this was the place to come tonight," said Silverjet's singer, Luke Tierney.
When Keanu Reeves and his band, Dogstar, finally appeared, the actor could have played the bass with his elbows and still caused fits of fainting. As it turned out, Reeves played with workmanlike concentration, focusing his attention on the neck of his instrument and laying down a noticeably solid bass line beneath Dogstar's melodic, straight-ahead rock songs.
Throughout Dogstar's hour long set, which drew mostly from the band's unreleased CD, "Our Little Visionary," Reeves neither spoke nor sang (save for a few words during a cover of "Ticket to Ride.") He kept to his side of the stage, letting Rob Mailhouse, the band's drummer and Bret Domrose, the band's lead guitarist, only singer and principal songwriter take most of the limelight.
Dogstar's music is -- perfectly OK. Were the band to stand wholly on Domrose's talents (instead of Reeves' good looks), Dogstar would fare as well as any other generic post-grunge act. Domrose's songs are tuneful, his voice is suitably husky, and his lyrics are average. (From "No Matter What: "There will always be a place/ Can't you see it in my face, girl/Ooh, girl I want you.")
Each song was met with ardent whoops and shrieks, but Domrose could have been reciting the national anthem for all anyone cared. Every move Reeves made -- running his hand through his tousled hair, jerking his bass forward on the beat -- sent women into a panic.
Yet, as Reeves once said of his role in Dogstar, "I'm just a bass player, man." The actor, ever the strong and silent type, may have found one of his best roles yet.
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