While sitting at home these past few weeks, binging NCIS for the second (third??) time, working from home, and annoying my cats with too much love, I realized that I haven’t written about so many things that I experienced in the year before the world got turned upside down. I won’t speculate as to why because they’ll mostly just be flimsy excuses, but since I have the time and opportunity now, here goes nothing. These will be in no particular order because time is arbitrary and relative and I’m not that organized, okay?
I found The Struts maybe two years ago. My sister had been holding out on me it seems because the first and only song that I’d heard apparently was like three years old and she was like, “Oh yeah, you didn’t know about them?” when I excitedly showed it to her. “One Night Only” immediately evoked a connection because I heard the influence of Freddie Mercury right off the bat. I love Freddie. I love Queen. I will gush about them at a later date.
The Struts are big and bold; they write moderately deep lyrics often presented with 
heavy camp, and their lead singer seems to embody Mercury in looks– just look at an early picture of Queen and then at Luke Spiller, and that’s obvious. Vocally, he’s also reminiscent of Mercury, and I do not say that lightly. But you can also hear the heavy influence of The Rolling Stones, especially in their instrumentals. Classic sound, Glam look, and not at ’60s/70’s star prices? Perfection.
I had decided when I saw Panic! At The Disco that I was going to see more live music, so I bought tickets for their show at House of Blues Cleveland in September. The venue combined with Luke Spiller’s channeling of Young Freddie really made me feel like I was witnessing history after the fact. I promise I will stop talking about Freddie and Queen now.
I had to laugh when The Struts came on stage. There was someone in the crowd near me who was very upset it was taking so long for them to get started after the opener (JJ Wilde, a fantastic opener in her own right). It was only fitting that they started with Primadonna Like Me– pretty aptly getting the message across that we were dealing with rockstars.
The whole show was high energy. There were costume changes. They worked the crowd, including pulling a superfan on stage to perform a song– it was her 11th birthday, and she’d already seen them 5 times. The setlist was perfection, including my favorites: “In Love With A Camera,” “Tatler Magazine,” and “I Do It So Well.”
You expect a performer to be glistening with sweat by the end of a performance, but you know they’re special when they’re not even half-way through and you already see them drenched, especially since they’re wearing more eye makeup than you are and are seriously threatening their look to give their all to a show. The Struts are fantastic performers and musicians in their own right, and I am so glad that I not only found them but also committed to seeing them. My obsession with Queen made the night that much more magical. The Struts are cut from the same cloth as the original rockstars and I highly recommend checking them out on the music player of your choice and in person.
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