Guardians Of The Jukebox (Rich Ward’s 80’s tribute band)

[DrewJD82]

I didn’t even know this band was a thing until a buddy of mine hit me up telling me they were playing near me this month. They’re really f*cking good and I’m a big fan of Rich Ward (Stuck Mojo and Fozzy), dude always has killer tones and his stage presence is entertaining as hell to watch.



My bud is friends with Rich, I totally forgot the show was tonight and just got a text “Yo, when ya going to be here tonight? Rich put you on the list.”, thankfully I planned to do f*ck all this weekend so I’m good to go! This will be a good time!

 

[la szum]

Have a blast, Drew!

 

[Stone]

Enjoy have a great time

 

[Baba]

VERY cool, right up my alley! I watched a few songs, and will watch more later.

Back in early 2021, because all of the bands (including mine), were on hiatus, I actually filled in with an 80's outfit, a lot like this one. It was tracks, drums, bass, guitar, and singer. They were auditioning drummers and guitar players, but they were short on guitar players, so I "filled in" for the drummer auditions a couple of times. It was fun!

 

[DrewJD82]

I forgot I made this thread!

I’ll be setting up an AMA with Rich soon. Dude is such a cool motherf*cker! I met my bud there and he immediately brought me backstage and started showing me Rich’s guitars-

He’s all Kemper these days. He used to do 2 full stacks onstage with Fozzy, then went to a Kemper and 2 full stacks but no mics, they were just for him for the pants flapping stuff. Now it’s just the Kemper. He’s also got an AxeFX at home he loves, but said “Man, once I learn something I just stick with it. There’s all these DAWs out there now and I’m just ‘Nope! I know Pro Tools, I ain’t changin!” While he was tearing down he goes “Oh! I got a USB stick in my drawer, you got a Kemper?” he was going to give me all his profiles right there!

Great tones the whole night, he keeps it pretty rockin’ throughout the set, putting guitars in songs there wasn’t guitars previously. Really impressed with the whole setup. All the videos/screens they have are theirs and Rich did all the video work himself. Every musician in that band is outstanding at what they do. There’s some tracks for extra backing vocals and some of the synth stuff, but the core sound of what you can hear in that vid is live. What probably blew me away the most was how consistent everything sounded from song to song. All the levels were just perfectly balanced, regardless of different sounds. Their FOH guy has a pretty easy job, he’s pretty much turning everyone up and is mainly mixing the vocals the whole night. Hahaha at one point a security guy came up and told him not to pass 90dB, he turns to me and goes “He didn’t say I couldn’t run this drum reverb into the subs, though” then starts laughing like a madman.

The second that dude hits the stage it’s showtime and it doesn’t stop until he’s offstage. That dude has the most fun stage presence I’ve ever seen and I have no doubt he can jumprope like a motherf*cker. I know Fozzy ain’t everyone’s favorite band, I only checked them out because of Rich (dude’s had monster guitar tones for decades) and there’s a couple songs I can dig. Fun, party music. But if ya haven’t seen Rich doing The Duke thing, check out the vid below-