BOC: BOC @ The College of Staten Island, Staten Island NY, November 18 2006

[Warrick Bell]

BOC @ The College of Staten Island, Staten Island NY, November 18 2006 

Only four members of the band were on stage but that didn't stop them making a lot of noise or having a good time. After the first song Eric announced that Allen was ill, but that didn?t stop new members Jules Radino on drums and local boy Richie Castellano on bass really showing themselves to fit well with the Eric and Buck and the band's music. Castellano in particular was astounding; playing a 5-string bass he's equally impressive with a pick or fingers. He plays chords, he plays funky pops and slaps, he beats on the body of the guitar, he fingertaps, he plays harmonics (!) and he also sings. Radino drives it all along with a kit of sensible size that he makes sound far bigger than it actually is. 
Richie's father opened the proceedings and Eric gave a number of shout-outs for Castellano's House of Music during the show. Part-way through the set Eric introduced a friend of Richie's named Andy Ascolese to do keyboard duties; Eric said this guy had never played with them before so it would be interesting to see how it went but he handled his part very well and was even given a guitar during a couple of songs, so they were able to do a 4-man guitar jam during the encore. 
Buck played a long melodic mostly-solo piece (Jules and Richie dropped in for a short while towards the end) just before the band launched into Reaper; this was my first BOC concert so I don't know if this is something he usually does. It's not anything I?ve heard on any of the official live releases. 

Setlist: 
	The Red and the Black 
	OD'd On Life Itself 
	Burnin' For You (Buck vocal) 
	This Ain't the Summer of Love 
	Shooting Shark (Buck vocal; Eric keys - he took off his glasses while he was setting up the music sheets!) 
	Harvester of Eyes 
	Cities on Flame with Rock and Roll (Eric played his "Cities on Flame" guitar
		[ http://www.ericbloom.net/images/Guitars/cities_lg.jpg ]) 
	Black Blade (Andy keys) 
	Then Came the Last Days of May (Buck vocal; Andy guitar) 
	Godzilla (with bass and drum solos) 
	[long Buck solo] 
	(Don't Fear) The Reaper (Buck vocal) 
Encore: 
	Hot Rails to Hell (Richie vocal; Andy keys and guitar)