This is two weeks old LOL.
QOTSA/NIN at the Hollywood Bowl Pt.1
I’ve never been at the Hollywood Bowl before, so we headed out early for parking issues LOL. I forgot the opening act, but we never got to see them. I bought both a Queens and a NIN shirt.
I’ve seen QOTSA before at The Glass House at Pomona, CA on February 22nd, 2002…and that my friends was one of the best shows I’ve ever seen, with Nick Oliveri, Mark Lanegan, Josh Homme switching vocal duties (and singing altogether for Song for the Deaf and Song for the Dead), and amazing musicianship from Oliveri, Homme, Troy Van Leeuwen and Joey Castillo (their live best drummer to date, side by side with Dave Grohl).
Here’s the setlist for the evening as best as I can remember it:
Go With The Flow
Avon
I Think I Lost My Headache
The Fun Machine Took A Shit and Died (supposedly lost/stolen track)
Monsters in the Parasol
In My Head
Burn The Witch
Song for the Dead
Tangled Up In Plaid
-untitled instrumental-
Little Sister
No One Knows
With Nick gone, I thought this lineup lost its edge. The songs are great, don’t get me wrong, but when you take out a force like Mr. Natural Light, you’re gonna expect a big difference. Sure this is Josh’s boat, and it’s his songs nonetheless, I know his style (well maybe not entirely LOL), and I know his supposed format for Queens, and you gotta hand it out to this guy who knows what he’s doing. All I’m saying is that it just sounds different, which is probably what he’s going for. I’m not gonna be the jackass that’ll say the band sucks without Nick.
So I’ll say it again: it sounds different.
It’s great to see Alain Johannes and Natasha Schneider live. By the way, Natasha rocks those keyboards live, and plays them quite interestingly (see the reruns for SNL with Will Ferrell to see what I mean). Other than Pogo (Marilyn Manson) and Sean (Hera), I’ve never seen anyone look good rockin’ the keys!
QOTSA/NIN at the Hollywood Bowl Pt.2
My friends, if you haven’t seen Nine Inch Nails, I would highly recommend that you do. Being a fan since Broken, I’ve owned every album they’ve put out, and every information I could get. Like Trent is 10 years and a day older than me LOL. I’ve learned a lot from his body of work, and I’ve applied that a LOT for my musical endeavors.
Here’s the setlist as best as I can remember:
Pinion (of course)
You Know What You Are
Terrible Lie
The Wretched
March Of The Pigs
Closer
Love Is Not Enough
The Frail/La Mer
Eraser
Right Where It Belongs
Wish
Burn
Reptile
Sin
Hurt
Suck
Only
Head Like A Hole
The Hand That Feeds
The lighting was really good. They have these props that light up on certain songs. As soon as The Frail (or La Mer) was playing, the white seethru curtain was again dropped (they opened Pinion and You Know What You Are with that over the stage) and you can see video art clips from a projector (reminded me of Pink Floyd a LOT). When Right Were It Belongs played, they showed Pres. Bush and the wife dancing, and everybody BOOED! LOL, that was really funny… a lot of heckling, cursing, but mostly boos.
I was happy that they played Eraser and Reptile, but that didn’t stop there. Being a fan alone was worth it, being there was something else. It made me think what to do next for music, and what to strive for in the future.
NIN reminded me of Pink Floyd (for theatrics and the art stuff) and U2 (this kind of music needs to be played on a bigger scale!).
I walked away from the Hollywood Bowl smiling knowing I’ve watched one of the important bands ever to exist in this world.
