On June 28th in the year 2019 The Black Keys released their first album in over five years called “Let’s Rock.” The title was inspired by the last words uttered by convicted murderer Edmund Zagorski right before he was executed in an electric chair. The electric chair that appears on the cover of the album made an appearance out by the concessions (I wanted a picture but the line was too long) and later in the show a giant version appeared onstage. Both the album and ensuing tour was highly anticipated and thus allowed them to command a fairly pricy sum for a ticket. As a result Kyle and I were the only ones out of our group willing to fork over the dough.
The album “Let’s Rock” did not grab me at first but just kept getting better and better with every successive spin and only after many listens could I fully appreciate the greatness and genius of the album. I love albums that creep up on you like that. Even without this album I would have gone to see them again but my love of this album turned the show into an absolute must-see.
This show was a far cry from the only other time I had seen them across the parking lot at Soma over nine years before this. For starters the Sports Arena is roughly five times the size of Soma as far as seating capacity. This was also not the two-piece band that I saw all those years ago. As the stage grew larger so too did the size of the touring band in order to fill out the sound of the more intricate songwriting. Don’t get me wrong, by and large these songs could survive with the band as a two-piece but dammit people paid good money to see this show and one could tell that the band intended on giving the people their money’s worth. This equated to a bass player and two additional guitarists as well as a proper projection and light show.
These guys totally aced the songs that they chose to play. I was floored from the get go when they opened with “I Got Mine” and they never really let up after that. Much to my delight they played a good number of songs from the new album including two of my favorites “Fire Walk With Me” and “Walk Across the Water.” These guys have a very timeless sound that would be hard to place in an era if I was listening to them for the first time but thankfully they live in this era.
SETLIST: I Got Mine, Eagle Birds, Tell Me Lies, Gold on the Ceiling, Fever, Next Girl, Fire Walk With Me, Walk Across the Water, Everlasting Light, Howlin’ for You, Your Touch, Strange Times, Tighten Up, Thickfreakness, Ten Cent Pistol, Little Black Submarines, Lonely Boy, Lo/Hi, Go, She’s Long Gone
Larry departed first thing this morning and the rest of us woke up still a little buzzed from the day before. I wanted to get something in me before the hangover set in and sometimes beer does not always go down easy in this situation so when Ken said he was going to the store I requested a bottle of Jager or Fireball but because Ken is Ken we ended up with a bottle of both.
H09909 was the first band on the bill for the day that I wanted to check out based on me seeing the end of their set a few years back when they opened for Ministry. They were alright but for some reason we just were not feeling it.
Stone Temple Pilots was up next. The last time I saw Stone Temple Pilots was at this very festival four years ago with Chester Bennington singing. Fast forward to 2019 and now sadly both Chester and Scott Weiland are dead but the other guys in the band wanted to move on so I was naturally curious to see how well STP Version 3.0 would sound with the new singer Jeff Gutt. It turns out not so bad. Gutt’s voice is more suited to these songs than Chester’s ever was and he never seemed to try to imitate the massive personality that Scott was.
SETLIST: Down, Wicked Garden, Vasoline, Big Bang Baby, Big Empty, Plush, Interstate Love Song, Roll Me Under, Dead & Bloated, Trippin’ on a Hole in a Paper Heart, Sex Type Thing
Had it really been three years since I last saw Marilyn Manson? Yes and ironically enough it was when they opened for Slipknot. Since that last time they released the album Heaven Upside Down and dismissed Twiggy from the band due to rape allegations but even that was two years ago. This time Marilyn Manson himself seemed like he may have been a little drunk but that certainly did not stop him from tearing up the stage with a good mix of super aggressive songs like “Irresponsible Hate Anthem” and “Antichrist Superstar” with more accessible staples like “The Dope Show” and “The Beautiful People.”
SETLIST: Irresponsible Hate Anthem, This Is The New Shit, Rock Is Dead, The Dope Show, Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This), Say10 (preceded by “God’s Gonna Cut You Down”), Antichrist Superstar, The Beautiful People
It was funny that Rob Zombie was billed as the headliner for the night right after Marilyn Manson since Zombie now has John5 playing guitar and Ginger Fish playing drums. I have seen Zombie several times and noticed that having these two guys as a part of his band seemed to rejuvenate Zombie to the level of energy he used to display when he was still in White Zombie and the early days of his solo records. “Electric Head, Part 2” was just the swift kick in the ass I needed and besides that familiar crushing riff in “Thunder Kiss ‘65” was easily my favorite moment of the set and possibly even day. Unlike the day before we all managed to stay together this time and get back to our hotel with enough time to shut it down so we could do it all over again one more time.
SETLIST: Dead City Radio and the New Gods of Supertown, Superbeast, Living Dead Girl, More Human Than Human, Get Your Boots On! That’s the End of Rock and Roll, Electric Head, Part 2: The Ecstacy, In the Age of the Consecrated Vampire We All Get High, Well, Everybody’s Fucking in a U.F.O., Pussy Liquor, Ddd, Thunder Kiss ’65, Helter Skelter, Dragula
Having previously always taken at least a year off between attending Aftershock festivals we had no intention of making 2019 our first back-to-back year… but then the lineup was released and it was too insanely good to pass up. Bob, Larry and I all flew in together and met up with Joe, who flew in from Portland within minutes of our flight landing. We then made our way over to the Embassy Suites where much to nobody’s surprise our room was not ready as this was only about 9:30 in the morning. We were not, however, too early to grab some beers at a nearby convenience store to go along with our omelet and potatoes that we snagged from the still open breakfast buffet at the Embassy Suites. A short while after refusing to pay $100 for a BS early check-in fee we were approached by the guy working the front desk who told us our room was suddenly ready. This is about the time Ken showed up to join in on the action so I am convinced management just did not want five degenerates sitting around getting wasted in their lobby at 10 am.
It is about this time that Larry started to question if he should stay the whole weekend because of surprise work that was doled out to him. He found out a massive project was going to be due Monday morning when he checked his email as soon as we landed in Sacramento. At first he thought he could slough it off but as the morning went on reality sunk in that he simply could not so he made the decision to stay only the first day and catch a plane back to San Diego on Saturday morning. It sucked that we were going to lose him for two of the three days but one less body was not completely unwelcome as our room turned out to have two double beds and a pull out couch instead of two queen beds as originally thought.
First up for the festival and the day was Philip H. Anselmo & The Illegals. It was announced that these lads would be opening on the final leg of Slayer’s farewell tour and playing nothing but Pantera songs so it seemed reasonable that we may get nothing but Pantera songs for this set as well. That turned out to be the case and jeezus it was awesome! They played eight choice songs that whipped everyone into a frenzy and left my voice raw from screaming along. Why the festival organizers put these guys on so early I will never know.
SETLIST: Mouth For War, Strength Beyond Strength, Becoming, Yesterday Don’t Mean Shit, I’m Broken, Walk, Domination/Hollow, Fucking Hostile
After climaxing so early in the day it was a welcome respite to have some time to burn before Clutch, which was the next band I really cared about. In the meantime we checked out Motionless in White, which I can only describe as Marilyn Manson Jr., and I Prevail, which basically followed the Linkin Park template but with far worse results.
While I am always pumped to see Clutch unfortunately they never play the old shit that I really want to hear, which is material from the first few albums. This occasion was no different but it was a solid overall set with newer staples “Earth Rocker” and “X-Ray Visions” as well as a couple songs from Blast Tyrant and one from Jam Room.
SETLIST: The Mob Goes Wild, X-Ray Visions, Evil, Cypress Grove, In Walks Barbarella, Earth Rocker, Gimme the Keys, Willie Nelson, Electric Worry, One Eye Dollar
A wildcard for the festival was Staind because they had been on hiatus off and on since about 2012 when Aaron Lewis decided to do a solo country thing. I had not personally seen them for 16 years but did get a chance to see them five times before this in the late 90’s/early 2000’s. They sounded great and Aaron Lewis was moving around much more than he used to back in the day. I am sure this was in no small part due to his diversion into country music.
SETLIST: Eyes Wide Open, Paper Jesus, Not Again, Fade, For You, Crawl, Right Here, Outside, So Far Away, Raw. It’s Been Awhile, Mudshovel
It is about this time I passed out the gummy rings I had brought to everyone but Larry because I wanted them to kick in right as the night’s headliner Slipknot was going on. Besides Philip H. Alselmo and the Illegals today was all about Slipknot for me. It had been three years since I last saw them and now they had a new album under their belt, the outstanding We Are Not Your Kind that was released two months prior to this show, which was just enough time to digest it before witnessing the juggernaut that is Slipknot. Less than an hour after eating the gummy rings everyone in our group got separated from each other and phones do not do a bit of good in densely packed situations such as this so unfortunately I found myself watching Slipknot by myself…unless you count the other 49,995 people that were there. No matter how many times I see Slipknot I am astounded by the energy projected from nine guys going crazy on a stage. It is almost like a giant fireball getting as close as it can to burning you without actually burning you. “Solway Firth” killed live and I was just about dead after they played “The Heretic Anthem” right after but this was only halfway through their set.
SETLIST: People = Shit, (sic), Get This, Unsainted, Before I Forget, Solway Firth, The Heretic Anthem, Psychosocial, The Devil In I, Prostetics, Vermillion, Wait and Bleed, Sulfur, All Out Life, Duality, Spit It Out, Surfacing
It does not surprise me that everyone got separated after the weed kicked in because we had been drinking since 10 am but it did surprise me that I found Larry before I left. We decided to avoid the craziness of catching an Uber and walked along the river all the way back to the hotel to find our compadres waiting for us with a cold one.
After being shuttered for 10 years and going through a multi-million dollar renovation, the East County Performing Arts Center in El Cajon was transformed into The Magnolia. With this grand re-opening came heavy promotion of its upcoming events beginning in September and the third show to occur was this one. When I saw the advertisement the show was dubbed “Roy Orbison & Buddy Holly: Rock ‘N’ Roll Dream Tour” and went on to describe the show as a “cutting edge holographic performance – Roy & Buddy’s remastered vocals accompanied by a live band.” Intriguing to say the least and a no-brainer as it was the closest thing I would ever come to seeing a live performance of these two legends.
Since I stumbled across this show before tickets went on sale I was afforded the opportunity to buy tickets right when they went on sale, which ended up yielding 7th row seats for Ingrid and I. The first thing I noticed as we walked into the 1,200-seat venue was the overall age of the crowd. This was definitely an “Alaska cruise” of shows and I was relatively sure someone in this crowd might break a hip before the night was over.
I had seen this same technology in action at a Nine Inch Nails show previously but they used it for atmosphere instead of the re-creation of a single person. Essentially there was a super thin see-through screen across the front of the stage that the hologram was projected onto and a live band played behind the screen that consisted of a traditional rock ensemble of two guitar players, a bassist, and a drummer that were accompanied by two female backup singers and a keyboardist. The musicianship was off the charts as the timing had to be spot on to match the hologram versions of both Roy Orbison and Buddy Holly.
As soon as Roy Orbison appeared as if he had just been hoisted onto the stage from below I was mesmerized. It was very easy to suspend disbelief because of the level of detail in the hologram itself as well as the fantastic musicianship. Until this production I had forgotten what a gem of a voice Roy had but quickly remembered as his holographic doppelganger ran through some of his greatest hits like “Only the Lonely,” “You Got It” and “Oh Pretty Woman.”
Just like that Roy turned to dust and out came Buddy Holly. His hologram captured his happy essence as a performer doing songs such as “Peggy Sue,” “Oh, Boy!,” “That’ll be the Day” and my favorite Buddy song “Everyday.” It is very sad to think that he was only 22 years old when he died and begs the question of how much the musical landscape would have been different if that plane had not crashed.
After each legend had his turn in the spotlight there was a short intermission followed by another mini-set from each. Each set was interlaced with movie type footage of interviews with prominent people that knew these two and pictures aplenty. The most memorable of these interviews was Tom Petty who said that he was recording with Roy within 30 minutes of meeting him and they came to be really good friends. Then he shared a moment where Roy leaned over to him and said, “hey I brought in a couple Cherry Cokes” like they were some kind of contraband.
There is no substitute for a great live performance but damn did this come close. Bravo to the producers of this production for putting together something really special.
When Primus mastermind Les Claypool and the only son of John Lennon and Yoko Ono decided to form a band the results were out of this world. Being a Primus fan I already worshipped the bass playing of Les Claypool but was completely unfamiliar with Sean Lennon except in namesake. I do not remember exactly how I came to hear about this collaboration but do remember talking with Wayne about them to which he stated Sean sounds exactly like John did. I missed the duo’s last San Diego appearance in late December so when I caught wind of them rolling back through to promote their second album South of Reality and play the Music Box on a Friday I was ecstatic. It is not very often that I get to see a band that I have not previously seen and I had only been to the Music Box one other time way back when it was called Anthology.
After having a couple beers with Wayne and his friend at the nearby Crack Shack I ate the couple gummies I brought with me as we walked over to the venue. Once inside we grabbed a beer and headed upstairs to watch the opener Particle Kid from the side of the stage. The singer/guitar player had good energy but the music was completely foreign to me. To be fair it is rare that an opening band knocks my socks off which is why I am always trying to time my appearance to purposely miss the opener altogether.
As soon as Particle Kid went off we made our way down to stake a claim on the floor in front of the stage so we could get the full effect of the Lennon Claypool Delirium. We thought we were in good position but the crowd was filled with GIANTS and by the time we realized their existence all around us the floor was too full to move somewhere else without blatantly bulldozing people. I am 6’1” and there were several people in the crowd that had to be at least 6’8”. Ridiculous. This happened to be the weekend of Comic Con but save for a guy that looked like he was wearing a giant fork and a guy with lightning bolt glasses a la Aladdin Sane Bowie this did not appear to be the same crowd as Comic Con. All in all it was a good, respectful crowd as hardly anyone was on their phones. A novel idea I know, right? Come to a concert to actually watch the concert?!?
The Claypool Lennon Delirium achieved something that not every band can: presence. The four piece played in front of a trippy moving background of outer space, which was very fitting for the music they were playing. Backed by a hard hitting, top hat-wearing drummer that rocked Lemmy’s facial hair motif and a top hat wearing keyboardist, the chemistry between Sean and Les was undeniable. There was good banter between “Shiner” and “Kernel” and it was really special when they were both singing and acting the part of co-frontman. Sean wore a dark yacht captain style hat and demonstrated monster guitar wizardry on the same chrome Jaguar-type guitar throughout. Les was being Les and makes me question everything I think I know about how a bass guitar can sound each time I see him. Playing some kind of electric stand up bass with a violin bow at one point did not do much to change this.
The Music Box only holds about 700 people and those in attendance would probably all agree on how fantastic the show was. Les made a comment at one point about how great the sound was for them up on stage and about how this set was longer than usual for them – clocking in at 1 hour 45 minutes+, which explains why they laced their set with covers. From the opening cover of Pink Floyd’s “Astronomy Domine” I thought that this is what it would sound like if John Lennon had been the singer of Pink Floyd. Sean’s voice did sound eerily similar to John, which was on full display during the closing cover of the Beatles “Tomorrow Never Knows” despite his vocals being bathed in effects. It was at this point at midnight that I turned into a pumpkin so I could get home to wake at 5:30 for a 7:20 flight and missed the encore of Primus’ “Southbound Pachyderm.” Damn!
SETLIST: Astronomy Domine, Cricket and the Genie (Movement I, The Delirium), Cricket and the Genie (Movement II, Oratorio Di Cricket), Little Fishes, Blood and Rockets: Movement I, Saga of Jack Parsons – Movement II, Too the Moon, South of Reality, The Court of the Crimson King, Breath of a Salesman, Boriska, Easily Charmed by Fools, Cosmic Highway, Boris the Spider, Cricket Chronicles Revisited: Part 1, Ask Your Doctor – Part 2, Psyde Effects, Like Fleas, Tomorrow Never Knows, Southbound Pachyderm
Sir Paul. Macca. Beatle. Legend. Whatever you want to call him does not change the undeniable fact that he has played a major part in shaping the musical and cultural landscapes of history. And lucky me he decided to come back to San Diego for the first time since 2014 when I first “saw” him. I say it like that because if you recall the first time I attended a Paul McCartney concert I was sat on the side of the stage where I could hear perfectly but had to settle for watching his image projected onto the side of a wall. So technically this was the first time “seeing” him. Also lucky for me one of my co-workers hooked up tickets for Ingrid and I again with an exclusive presale she had access to.
What more could I say about a man who has had so much written about him before? The music has always spoken louder than anything and tonight was no different. He was on tour to promote his newest effort Egypt Station (free copy of the album came with the ticket) that was released on September 7, 2018, which marked his 17thsolo album! The remarkable thing about that number is that it does not even include his work with the Beatles or Wings. The guy is a machine. He has set the bar high for himself and he exceeded that bar again this particular evening by playing damn near 40 songs again!
The highlights for me were “Let ‘Em In,” which was blissful, “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da,” because the contagiously bouncy bass line had the whole place bouncing along and “Helter Skelter,” because it is about as close as I’m ever going to see Paul McCartney doing heavy metal and there is something very satisfying about seeing a 77 year old man just going for it with his screaming, probably because it gives me hope that I will never be anything but that guy when I get older.
There was a funny moment worth mentioning regarding me leaving at some point to relive myself and get refill $15 beers. Since we met up with some friends at the bar inside Spaghetti Factory prior to the concert I may have been “on a good one” by this time and could not find my way back to our seats after the refills. After walking up and down the aisles nearby and trying to text/call Ingrid someone close to me got my attention and pointed it towards Ingrid, who was standing up trying to wave me down. Once I registered this and started on my way back to our seats the entire section of people were cheering me on. They were probably just happy I was not wandering around distracting them from the show any longer. The funny part of the story is that is Ingrid’s signature move. Literally every time we go to a show and she leaves her seat she gets lost and cannot find her way back and I always shake my head thinking just retrace your steps. Now the joke’s on me. Cheers to beers.
SETLIST: A Hard Day’s Night, Junior’s Farm, Can’t Buy Me Love, Letting Go, Who Cares, Got to Get You Into My Life, Come On to Me, Let Me Roll It, I’ve Got a Feeling, Let ‘Em In, My Valentine, Nineteen Hundred and Eighty-Five, Maybe I’m Amazed, I’ve Just Seen a Face, In Spite of All the Danger, From Me to You, Dance Tonight, Love Me Do, Blackbird, Here Today, Queenie Eye, Lady Madonna, Eleanor Rigby, Fuh You, Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite!, Something, Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da, Band on the Run, Back in the U.S.S.R., Let It Be, Live and Let Die, Hey Jude, Birthday, Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (Reprise), Helter Skelter, Golden Slumbers, Carry That Weight, The End
