The Nielsen Trust, Nick Perri & The Underground Thieves at Durty Nellies (6/11/2021)

When I started Defenders of the Faith in January of last year, I fully intended for it to be an all you can eat buffet of album reviews, interviews, and concert reviews. Then that whole COVID thing happened and the “concert reviews” went out the window. From a metal site owner/writer perspective, there were pros and cons to this unexpected shift in life. The pro was now that my hard and heavy heroes had literally nothing to do for the foreseeable future, I got to talk their ears off in some memorable interviews. The con was that while I cherish these opportunities to talk one on one with these legends, I didn’t get to see them in the environment I love the most: the stage.

Everyone in and around heavy metal lives for shows: the bands who play them, the fans who attend them, the promoters who book them, and the loyal crews who put them all together. We’ve been chomping at the bit for anything resembling “normalcy”, settling for masked, socially distanced, reduced capacity shows in the interim (see my last concert review of Diamond Rexx in October, 2020). And after 15 months of sheer hell, the walls that were COVID restriction laws came crashing down here in Illinois. What better way to celebrate the occasion than with a homecoming show from Illinois’ very own Rick Nielsen of Cheap Trick and his family band, The Nielsen Trust?

Nick Perri & The Underground Thieves

The evening began with an electric set from Nick Perri & The Underground Thieves. Prior to this show, I had never heard of Perri or his band of thieves (pun intended). I’m usually hesitant to check out openers I don’t know. Nine times out of ten, these openers are mediocre modern rock hacks who knew somebody who knew somebody to get them on the bill. Not Perri. Throughout the course of his set, Perri played selections from his debut album, Sun Via, released last August. Musically, these songs touch upon blues rock, hard rock, roots rock, power pop, and even prog. He also blazed through faithful renditions of Cream’s “Sunshine of Your Love”, Neil Young’s “Hey Hey, My My (Into the Black)”, and Tom Petty’s “Running Down a Dream”. His band is quite the unit: Always locked in and ready to jam, but never to the point of boredom à la Grateful Dead. If you’re a fun of good ol’ fashioned, down home rock n’ roll, do yourself a favor and check Nick Perri out. He looks like Neil Young and plays like Johnny Winter. What more could you ask for?

The Nielsen Trust

I’ve seen Rick Nielsen a handful of times over the years. I’ve seen him with Cheap Trick, as well as with KISS and Alice Cooper in the form of surprise guest appearances. However, I had never seen him with his latest project, The Nielsen Trust. Joining Rick in The Nielsen Trust are his sons Daxx on drums and Miles on guitars and vocals, as well as Miles’ wife, Kelly Steward, on accompanying vocals. It’s a simple premise, reminiscent of the solo shows Gene Simmons played a few years back: Let’s play intimate venues, dive deep into the Cheap Trick catalog, and have fun. Considering Cheap Trick has 20 albums to choose from, not to mention, a slew of singles and soundtrack appearances, the possibilities for an enthralling setlist are endless.

The band opened with the anthemic, “So Good to See You”, a song that Cheap Trick has only played 25 times since its 1977 release. It was followed by the one-two punch of “Just Got Back” and “He’s a Whore”. Though it might be hard to imagine anyone else singing in place of the legendary Robin Zander, Miles Nielsen and Kelly Steward proved themselves worthy within the first few songs of the set. Nielsen must’ve studied Zander growing up, nailing every last nuance of his unmistakable voice(s). Meanwhile, Steward assists on the higher, harder to hit register. Her vocal prowess came in particularly handy on “Tonight It’s You”.

About halfway through the show, Rick left the stage to take an intermission. The band took a breather as well, unplugging for “Over the Moon”, a Miles Nielsen original, and a stripped down version of “Surrender”. It took a little bit for the crowd to get into it, but by the end of the song, everyone was singing the refrain of “We’re all alright!”. Rick returned and the band plugged in for yet another Miles Nielsen song, “Hey Hey Hey”. My ears did a double take. Between the cryptic riffing and hypnotic vocals, I could’ve sworn this was a deep track off Cheap Trick’s debut, but nope. Like father, like son, Miles Nielsen inherited his father’s knack for brainy and zany rock n’ roll.

As the night raged on, the band was joined by Perri and Enuff Z’Nuff founder/namesake Chip Z’Nuff for an all star jam on “I Want You to Want Me”. This was followed by raucous takes on “California Man”, and Cheap Trick’s signature closer, “Goodnight”. The loyal crowd of roughly a couple hundred chanted for an encore and got it, sans Rick who had to catch a flight to Connecticut where Cheap Trick would be playing the next day. Miles lead the band through a dreamy rendition of “Voices”, before calling it a night.

Overall, I was very impressed by The Nielsen Trust. While the energy onstage is worlds apart from a Cheap Trick show, musically, they’ve got the goods and then some. Cheap Trick switches up their setlists every night, but if you feel they don’t dig deep enough, be sure to check out The Nielsen Trust when they come through your town. If nothing else, it’s worth it just to see patriarch Rick, charismatic and quirky as ever, unleashed in an intimate setting. They’re all alright indeed!

Setlist