Tag: robin finck

Nine Inch Nails – Lights In The Sky (over L.A.)

Posted on by mygoodgomez

Note: This is the second half of my Nine Inch Nails – Lights In The Sky 2008 Tour. The first half (from Seattle) can be found here.

I love Nine Inch Nails. I love Nine Inch Nails so much that when their Lights Over North America Tour was announced, I went twice. Seattle was amazing because I had no idea what to expect save for a great light show; LA was amazing because I knew exactly what to expect. Maybe that makes some sense, just read on if it doesn’t (and if it does…)

 

the amazing deerhunter (w/ the awkward Bradford Cox)
the amazing deerhunter (w/ the awkward Bradford Cox)

Deerhunter

+10 points for being LA when Deerhunter came around. Crystal Castles sort of bombed in Seattle because no one knew who they were. Admittedly, while they are getting pretty big in the indie world, I can’t really expect a bunch of metal-heads to be too interested with the 8-bit/electro/indie scene. I love both Crystal Castles and Deerhunter, and so do people in LA.

Bradford Cox is one freaking looking dude. The rest of Deerhunter looks fairly normal for an indie noise/ambient/rock group, but Cox stands out like a sore thumb. Luckily for us all, the music that roars out of the speaker towers makes you quickly forget any oddity that Deerhunter embodies. Their set was about 30 minutes long, just long enough for them to find a nice balance between their noise material and their more rocky/beat-driven songs. It went smoothly, and I think everyone enjoyed the set.

trent behind one of three massive walls of light
trent behind one of three massive walls of light

Nine Inch Nails

When I say that I fully knew what to expect the night of the concert, I honestly mean it. I wasn’t expecting anything new to come up. Maybe they’d tightened things up on the corners (not to say that the Seattle show was sloppy), but the show is so massive that it seems nearly impossible to change anything at all. Turns out I was fairly wrong.

Aside from the different set list (which I’ll discuss later), the light show had changed, and the performances were out of this world. In the Seattle post, I mention that this lineup is the best that NIN has ever had, but I said that because of how good they sounded. At the LA show, I realized that every member of the band brings something unique to the table besides their musical expertise. Whether being menacing, aggressive, staid, precise, or one of the many other things that each are on stage, NIN has captured what an over-the-top live show is.

One change to the light show from Seattle was the inclusion of a face morphing graphic during The Hand That Feeds. I don’t recall what was going on at that time in Seattle, but there certainly wasn’t a massive George W. Bush being shown. That night in Inglewood, the only graphic shown was Bush who seemed to be getting progressively older as the song went on. I thought it was weird, until I realized that Bush wasn’t getting older. He was morphing into John McCain. I say this with all honesty, I really thought he was just getting older at first…

The songs that were played throughout the night (+2 from the Seattle show) differed slightly from other tour dates. Unfortunately for me, The Great Destroyer was left out, so the insane spastic strobes and static that the song encompasses was greatly missed. God Given was played however, which almost makes up for the missed Destroyer. That song has a solid tech/glitch beat to it that makes me smile every time I hear it. The best part of the song though wasn’t the music at all, it was Finck. When the chourus dies, this creepy whispered line some in

i would never tell you anything that wasn’t absolutely true that hadn’t come right from his mouth and he wants me to tell you

and the song starts right up when the whisper ends. Finck was the guy who did the whispering live. Talk about something that comes straight from your nightmares. They had the light shining on his face like he was telling a horror story (and he might as well have been). Of course, they closed with Hurt & In This Twilight. It was a night that, when paired with Seattle’s date, makes up one of the best live shows I’ve ever seen.

Now I just have to seen them in a festival setting…

Set List

  1. 999,999
  2. 1,000,000
  3. Letting You
  4. Discipline
  5. March of the Pigs
  6. Head Down
  7. The Frail
  8. Closer (The Only Time)
  9. Gave Up
  10. The Warning
  11. Vessel
  12. 5 Ghosts I
  13. 17 Ghosts II*
  14. 19 Ghosts III*
  15. Ghosts Piggy
  16. The Greater Good
  17. Pinion
  18. Wish
  19. Terrible Lie
  20. Survivalism
  21. The Big Comedown
  22. 31 Ghosts IV
  23. Only
  24. The Hand That Feeds
  25. Head Like A Hole
  26. Echoplex
  27. Reptile
  28. God Given
  29. Hurt
  30. In This Twilight

Nine Inch Nails – Lights In The Sky (over Seattle)

Posted on by mygoodgomez

Last night at the Key Arena in Seattle, WA, I witnessed a legendary rock band at it’s finest. While I haven’t been listening to Nine Inch Nails (NIN) from its Pretty Hate Machine days (come on, I was 3 months old), I have been listening for quite some time now. After I went through my industrial phase a few years ago, NIN was one of the few bands I kept with me. Trent Reznor has been one of the outspoken artists when it comes to digital rights management, and to still be relevant twenty years after releasing a 5-star album is incredible.

This is the first of a two part post/review on NIN’s starting and ending dates (Seattle & L.A.) on their Lights In The Sky Over North America 2008 tour.

a fairly glamorous photo of crystal castles
a fairly glamorous photo of crystal castles

Crystal Castles

I’ll admit that I’m into indie music, but not THAT into indie music. I still enjoy some pop music, hip hop isn’t all bad, and I can appreciate classical and jazz music. That being said, Seattle’s NIN fans made me look like the most hipster of all hipsters when Crystal Castles came on stage. How does no one in this city know who the biggest name in rising indie/electro/8-bit/screaming music is?

As you might be able to tell, I love Crystal Castles. I saw them for the first time about a year ago at the Neighborhood Festival, and I loved what they brought to the table. Since then, they have released their self-titled LP and have been touring around like crazy.

Obviously, I loved them at this show. Though their set was pretty short at about 25 minutes, they are just an opening band, and they fit in all the greats. For me, the standout song was Crimewave. I know it’s not an entirely original song and that Alice sings the same chorus over and over, but when the opening synths start up, nothing else really matters. Of course, I also loved Courtship Dating, but I wish that she had actually sung the song instead of screaming and whispering it all (it kind of goes back and forth).

nine inch nails front man: trent reznor
nine inch nails front man: trent reznor

Nine Inch Nails

I’ll admit that I looked at the setlist from the NIN show the night before the Seattle show, but it was just so that I could prepare myself for the amazingness that I knew I’d be in front of. I didn’t watch any videos, and didn’t try to find any bootlegs. I don’t think that knowing the setlist beforehand is cheating, and I didn’t really want to spoil what I knew would be come insane visual effects.

To say that I wasn’t let down would be a grave understatement.

This show was what I consider to be the epitome of what a electronically infused rock show should be. First you have the music. NIN has been around for almost twenty years and has seven LPs worth of music to pick and choose from as a result. This set is nothing short of a best hits compilation fused with the key parts of NIN’s more recent releases; songs from each and every album were present. But while the songs played are important, they are nothing if they don’t sound good.

Trent Reznor has consistently written songs that fit his voice. He doesn’t stretch it in the studio to hit those high notes that everyone know could only be hit once. As a result, his live vocals are always on point. In addition, this NIN lineup is arguably the best in history. It consists of Trent Reznor, Alessandro Cortini, Robin Finck, Josh Freese, and Justin Meldal-Johnsen. Aside from Trent, the standout here is Robin Finck, who has been playing with Guns ‘n Roses as Slash’s sporadic replacement for the past twelve years. It’s great to have him back, and his dred-hawk is pretty damn sick. Every musician is spot on, and the only hiccups all night where technical ones, not musical mistakes.

So the music was great, what about these visuals that everyone has been buzzing about? I read an interview with Reznor from the New York Times that reads:

“What I’m trying to do is use the stage as an interactive instrument,” Mr. Reznor said. “I’m in the world of science fiction now.”

Trust me, NIN delivers, and here’s what I gathered from the Seattle show. There are three massive dot screens (the ones made up of tons of tiny round lights that work like a TV screen). They are all at different depths of the stage, so they can all be layered on top of one another. There is one wall of 112 lights that rotate around and change color. There are a ton of hanging fluorescent lights that flash on and off during a portion of the show. Finally, the massive dot screens have some sort of light/heat sensor to tell when the musicians step up to them and dynamically change what they show depending on where the musician is. So how is this an instrument? For the Echoplex encore, one screen is used as a drum machine. Yes, a drum machine. It is one of those scream-out-loud-because-this-is-so-amazing moments. This is why I payed for presale tickets to get on the floor.

So if you can’t tell, I loved this concert. NIN was able to combine stunning musicianship with brand new high-tech visuals to create one of the best rock shows I’ve ever been to. Remember, this is only part one of two. Don’t expect part two to be this long, but I’ll be back to mention if the show gets any better on the last North American tour date (L.A.).

Here’s a rundown of the 28 (!!!) song setlist:

  1. 999,999
  2. 1,000,000
  3. Letting You
  4. Discipline
  5. March of The Pigs
  6. Head Down
  7. The Frail
  8. Closer
  9. Gave Up
  10. The Warning
  11. The Great Destroyer
  12. 1 Ghosts I
  13. 25 Ghosts I
  14. 19 Ghosts III
  15. Piggy
  16. Wish
  17. Terrible Lie
  18. Survivalism
  19. The Big Come Down
  20. 31 Ghosts IV
  21. Only
  22. The Hand That Feeds
  23. Head Like A Hole
  24. Echoplex
  25. The Beginning of the End
  26. The Good Soldier
  27. Hurt
  28. In This Twilight

Also, that sick picture of Trent is from laura musselman‘s flickr account.