OTTAWA - Velvet Revolver burst onto the Corel Centre stage last night, fully loaded and ready to fire. Their hands on the trigger ... wait, I just can't fit all these gun-related figures of speech in here and still make sense. Plus, I know by then my ears will still be ringing.

'Cause when the odd beast that is the result of merging members of Guns N' Roses with charismatic, wailing Stone Temple Pilots frontman Scott Weiland comes to town, boy, we are talking L-O-U-D.

So loud that most of the time Weiland was all but drowned out. Of course, this was a rock concert and elegant acoustics aren't always part of the equation. For example, I could hear Weiland on the band's chart-topping power ballad Fall To Pieces, and I could hear him when he said "Motherf------ Ottawa, we are Velvet Revolver and we play motherf------ rock and roll."

But he was overpowered by the precise thrashing of Slash and his fellow veteran guitarist Dave Kushner on almost everything else.

CARTING A MEGAPHONE

Perhaps that's why the wiry Weiland -- who came out dressed up like the cliche stripper cop in heavy eye makeup and proceeded to doff almost everything until he was a near skeletal, tattooed, raccoon-eyed sweaty mess in low-riding pants -- has taken to carting a megaphone around most of the time. I have no idea why. He likes the megaphone, though. He used it on almost every song.

The Grammy-winning band (they earned best hard rock performance for Slither off their platinum 2004 debut Contraband) took the stage in front of 4,100 impatient fans in Kanata about a half-hour late. Since you know this reformed group of bad boys isn't snorting one last line of coke or downing a few more tequila shots backstage, just what is keeping them from their fans?

Slash didn't even smoke for the first half-hour on stage. What's next, a crew cut? After a while, Weiland lit a cigarette briefly, as did Slash. And well, it was just a big rock and roll relief for the rest of us, because in a city with a smoking ban, it doesn't get much more bad-ass than that.

The newly sober Weiland is at least writing and singing about all that toxic stuff, like the catchy Cocaine/Alcohol/Lady Lay/Withdrawal refrain from Superhuman.

The show featured mostly Contraband tunes -- including Illegal I or, as Slash introduced it before nearly proceeding to inhale his microphone, talk-box style, "Illegal F----- I" -- filled in with a few STP and GNR hits.

The band brought out some bad-ass in stodgy Ottawa too, as fans mostly stood, banged their heads back and forth and saluted the stage with beers and fingers in the air. Sitting on the shoulders of someone big and strong, a woman repeatedly lifted her bra and flashed Weiland -- and was superimposed on the big screens for all to see -- while he was giving the crowd a vague lecture on being "revolutionaries."

He looked over, scratched his head and said, "I haven't seen sh-- like that in a long time."

Neither have we, Mr. Rock Star, neither have we.

Sun Rating: 3 out of 5