Here's a sentence you probably don't hear very often in a review of a show by a band that's been around for 38 years: I wish they'd played more from their new album. In this case it's true -- the 2014 release, No Going Back, is a surprisingly strong album, and though the band may not have quite the same youthful fire that ignited their first few albums, they recorded some of Jake Burns' strongest songs to date on their most recent offering, into which they still packed a level of energy one might not expect from blokes in their mid-50s.
On stage, SLF tear it up. Original bassist Ali McMordie in particular seems ageless -- and on this night he was clearly enjoying himself. The set list focused mainly on their first three albums (heavily weighted toward the first two, actually), and I suppose that's to be expected when you've been around as long as these guys have and had such a blistering start to your career -- that's the stuff people come to hear. But I do wish Burns & Co. had slipped a few more of the new songs into the set -- those songs hold their own with that early stuff.