Overkill

Motorhead were damn loud. After raging through a set including such favourites as Killed by Death; Sacrifice ("Don't dance to this, you'll break your legs" quoth Lemmy); a R-A-M-O-N-E-S dedicated to the dearly departed brothers ("It wasn't a sad song when I wrote it, but it is now") and Dimebag Darrell that had the audience moshing like mad; Flying To Brazil; Over The Top, Just Because You've Got The Power, a couple from the much-loved (joking!) Another Perfect Day (Dancing On Your Grave, I Got Mine) and of course a few off their fabulous new one, Inferno (Killers, a super version of In The Name of Tragedy) and a host of others ... I knew almost every song, which I couldn't say for any other band save The Beatles, and sang along to a few. During a drum solo during Sacrifice one of the girls dancing in the wings flashed the audience. Despite monitor problems - Lemmy kept up a constant, somewhat good-natured grumbling about the lack of vocals - they sounded great.
These pictures are all natural light (for reasons I'll explain tomorrow ... grrr!) . I shot a load (so to speak), and a few turned out okay ... or perhaps I should say "one step above crap."

First, the man himself: Lemmy!



Philip spent most of his time on the other side of the stage ...



... but he did move around a bit. A devil-horns salute at a Motorhead show? Whodathunkit.



The band ... you can sort of see Mikkey Dee's hair, right?



Working the crowd a bit ... Fun fact: the mohawk stage right belongs to Big Jeezus Truck bassist Spag.



And the crowd goes wild! Actually, it was pretty wild to begin with.



They encored with Whorehouse Blues with Mikkey joining in on acoustic guitar (and tossing it neatly to a waiting stage hand at song's end) the perennial standby Ace of Spades and climaxing with Overkill.

• Show reminder: The 2nd Annual Ottawa Undergroud Music Festival with Mahjongg, Expatriates and Crush Buildings is on tonight. How underground is it? It's at Club SAW, so it's legitimately below ground level! The fest continues Friday night with Exhaust, Japanther, Akisakila and, all the way from The Netherlands, Zea. Same bat-time, same bat-place.