On February 8th the Crafthouse bar and grille in Pittsburgh hosted one of the 14 dates on this limited and very special tour. The acoustic tour. Keith Wallen of Breaking Benjamin fame opened the evening. Keith has also performed with Adelitus way and has written songs with Brian ‘Head’ Welch’s of Korn fame with his solo band Love and Death. He has also written saving abel and Pennsylvania natives Fuel.
The 8 song acoustic set covered 5 songs from his latest solo album, This world or the next, 2 former singles and his unique and chill Roxette Cover of the Look. Wallens vocal range peaked and grabbed the audience attention when he performed wildfire. The crowd was all in after that. He closed with Dream Away, (reached #32 on the rock charts) and his most played song on spotify. Not as hard hitting as the recorded version but a beautiful rendition on acoustic and showcasing the vocal power of this one man show. Do not miss the opportunity to see Keith solo or with Breaking Benjamin going on tour this summer with Seether, starset and Lacey sturm.

After a short intermission the Headling Christian Rock band and fellow western Pennsylvania natives hit the stage with candles and the color Red coming down from above. Twin Brothers Randy (Bass) and Anthony Armstrong (guitar) along with vocalist Micheal Barnes started this band in Linesville Pa Just 90 miles north of Pittsburgh. In 2002 they relocated the band to Nashville and have written 9 studio albums with several different drummers and guitarist. In 2006 their single Breathe into me reached Gold status and was nominated for and won christian rock album and song of the year. In 2011 the band Red appeared on Connan O’Brien and Jay leno. Now with a million monthly listeners on spotify and as many followers on Facebook this band has a solid following that fied the venue and was singing along to every song. On this acoustic tour they stripped down the heavy tones of the electric guitar for acoustics. Fill in drummer Brian Medeivos and Guitarist Lucio Rubino joined Red on this tour for a full sound. Michael’s vocals cut threw everysong beautiful and is another great vocalist who in my opinion may not get enough credit for his range of singing and occasional screams. Not as intense as regular Red tours but the intimacy of this tour and the songs being stripped down was a unique and awesome experience for the Red Fans who have been coming to their shows for 20 years now. The band played 15 songs from 4 of their 9 albums. 2011’s untill we have faces had the most songs performed on this tour. At one point the band left Micheal and Anthony on stage to perform a very personal version of Pieces from the 2006 end of silence album. The rest of the band returned and performed a beautiful cover of another Pennsylvania band, Fuel. Red made Hemorrhage their own. It was a fantastic cover with Micheal killing it on vocals again. Keith Wallen came returned to the stage and swapped vocals on the dong Sever. In between songs Randy would tell stories about the past 20 years and being from western Pennsylvania. The band ended the night with everyone singing along to Breathe into me. This show was worth every dollar. As a fan of Red I will continue to urge people to go to a Red show. They really are incredible

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Brian Altman

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