ACE FREHLEY AT THE BIG E, SPRINGFIELD, MA 9/27/15

September 27, 2015

Sunday night September 27th, was the night of a Super Blood Moon. A full lunar eclipse, a Blood Moon, coupled with the Moon being closer to the Earth than normal, a Super Moon, but that wasn’t what I was at the Big E for that evening. I was more interested in another Celestial Being that was poised to appear on the Xfinity Arena that evening, the one and only Space Ace.

Ace Frehley was set to appear for one of the final dates of his East Coast leg of this tour in support of his latest album, “Space Invader”. As the sun set and the moon starting rising the crowd grew as they watched and waited in anticipation of Ace and his band.

The crowd roared their approval as Ace’s band took to the stage, Scot Coogan on drums and vocals, Chris Wyse on Bass and the multi talented Richie Scarlet on guitar and vocals. The evening started with a couple of songs off of Ace’s latest album, “Toys” and “Gimme A Feeling” followed by a block of Kiss tunes that sent the crowd into a frenzy. “Rocket Ride”, “Parasite” and “Love Gun” showed us that he still has the chops to play old school Rock n Roll.

“Break Out”, “Space Invader” and “Snowblind” lead up to one of my favorite Ace tunes, about his hard partying days and his infamous car wreck, “Rock Soldiers”, another crowd sing along that lead into a solo by bassist Chris Wyse, an accomplished bassist who has worked with Jerry Cantrell, Ozzie Osbourne, Mick Jagger and The Cult.

“Strange Ways” followed up Chris’s solo and then another Ace standard started the crowd singing again. “New York Groove” Ace’s version of the English band Hello’s song. There are some things that are just meant to be and one of those things is watching Ace play a guitar with flashing lights for this song. “2 Young to Die” was next followed by another signature Ace tune from his Kiss days. “Shock Me” the only disappointing thing about this song was that there was no prelude, no story about being electrocuted, but the Ace guitar solo that followed was not a let down at all, smoking guitar and all.

Another nod to his 1978 solo album, “Rip It Out” was up next and closing out the set was another Kiss standard that has also been part of Ace’s set since I had first seen him with Frehley’s Comet on tour for their first album. The noise level rose considerably as everyone screamed and yelled waiting for them to come back and play a couple of more songs.

Returning to the stage Ace started talking about the car capital of the U.S. and started into “Detroit Rock City” ending the night with another fan favorite from his Kiss days, “Deuce” and another audience sing along.

Ace’s performance that evening was nothing short of energetic, with fantastic playing by the whole band. Another band I recommend seeing, I have yet to be disappointed by an Ace show!