First, I want to say a huge THANK YOU to the wonderful jessamineny. She is the one who bought a presale ticket for me when I could not access the site the day of the sale and I will owe her forever for it. I had the time of my life at the show because of her kindness towards me back in September and I am extremely grateful for it. I also had the privilege of waiting for a couple of hours with her and her friends before entering the venue and I had a lot of fun, even though it might not have shown because I was very tired on that night. All of these guys were very friendly and funny and I want to thank them for putting up with me. All of you here on ETS have put up with my bad English writing style for 18 months now and you've all been very kind about it but I can assure you that it's nothing compared with my atrocious accent. Once again, thank you everyone!
I got to my seat at 7:00. I had a very good seat; fourth row up from the pit with a great view of the stage. I was sitting next to one of the three direct entry to the floor so there was no one to my left. At first, I was very concerned about how little people there was. When Boris started playing at 7:30, I think that only 1/3 of the places were filled. That's a great shame because I enjoyed Boris a lot.
I was warned before the show that Boris was very loud and indeed they were but it was a very good loud! I did not know them at all and I will certainly check them out. If anyone have the setlist that they played, I would greatly appreciate it. Their drummer is amazing; he has a lot of energy and he puts out a great show as does the lead singer. They played both very agressive, noisy songs as well as more melodic, calmer ones. The singer have a voice that I found very pleasing to listen to. Again, it is a real shame that a lot of people missed their performance because I think that everyone that was there enjoyed them as much as I did.
NIN came out at 8:45. Before they did, the audience was cheering at every cloud of smoke that was blown on stage. By then, the Bell Centre was fully packed; I've seen that there was about 9.000 peoples there and I believe this to be correct. If it wasn't sold out, it was very close to be. I hope that the band noticed that and that it will encourage them to come back!
The crowd went wild as soon as 999,999 started up. The first band member I saw was Robin when 1,000,000 started. Trent was the last one to come out of the darkness and I saw that he was in a splendid form. Immediately, the energy from the band was felt by the audience who, in turn, reflected it back to the guys on stage. Everyone was dancing and singing right away. Josh seemed determined to kill his drum set! He was banging away as if his life depended on it.
Letting you was explosive. I think that it was during that song that Trent threw his mic stand up in the air, has everyone else seen this? That thing lift up like a spear, it went so high I could not believe it! The last 30 seconds of the song were fucking awesome. Justin, Robin and Josh were absolutely fantastic! It was even better than what we can see on the rehearsal video!
Discipline was next. Yes, I was standing like everyone else and I was dancing too but I did keep my shirt on! I loved how everyone knew the words to The Slip songs; people are definitely listening to that album. After that little dance number, Trent screamed at the top of his lungs "You fucking pigs... MARCH!!!" and we all went wild. March of the Pigs was pure madness. Trent did his trademark jump at the start of the song and let me tell you that for a short guy, he sure can jump high! Robin was all over the place. Justin was walking around like a wild man. It was absolutely fantastic! Head Down cooled the audience down a bit even though Robin was amazing. The Frail was cheered up a lot and it made me want a "Trent and a piano" tour very badly. Next came Closer. Of course it was very much cheered up by the audience and everyone was dancing, myself included. But the visuals of Closer blew me away. This is the most well-known song of NIN and a lot of people are thinking of it as a naughty, dirty song; the song about fucking! Many of us knows that Closer is so much more than that if you take the time to really listen to it and those visuals only made that more apparent. It was only the verses that Trent was singing up close to the camera and he looked almost terrifying. It added a whole new almost sinister layer to the meaning of what he was saying : " You let ME penetrate, violate, desecrate you" and that ME was not a nice person at all; it was almost evil in nature. And in the second verse, that almost evil persona was throwing at us all of the negativity and the desperation it had. I'll never listen to Closer the same way again.
Gave up was great. The visuals for Me, I'm Not are amazing! I was so very glad we got to hear it. I totally enjoyed The Great Destroyer, as did the audience. I could have sworn Trent's keyboard was going to fall but no, he managed to hold it at this impossible inclination degree! And yes, I remembered to check for the BSOD, which I saw I think four times at least.
I had the impression that the audience truly enjoyed the three Ghosts songs. I know I absolutely did. The visuals were breathtaking and added so much to the experience of the songs! I think that this is the kind of stuff that Trent had in mind when he put up that youtube contest for the Ghosts songs; and also with the images that came with the CDs. Those three songs made me wish for a Ghosts only concert.
The one thing that had left me a bit "meh" when I heard it before was the new Ghost/Piggy presentation but I finally "got it" when I heard it live. It sounds fantastic and I happily screamed "I lost my shit" along with the crowd!
I was totally amazed by the 3D effects for The Greater Good. Again, it turn a relatively benign song into something a lot sinister. "Breathe us in" took a whole new darker meaning, at least to me! Pinion, Wish and Terrible Lie were full of energy with everyone dancing and singing along. Yes, I did scream "fist fuck!" at the top of my lungs too; probably the only time in my life I will get to say this aloud in public! And there is something that I must say about Wish; you all know how much I worship Josh Fucking Freese; how much I adore him but still... I prefer Jerome's way of playing Wish's drums part. There, I've said it.
We had the 8 screens for Survivalism, with two lives one; the last upper right hand one on the folks next to the rail and the second lower left hand on on Trent. I find it very funny when I read that people in the seats were dead-like because that's exactly what I thought while watching the live feed of the people on the rail! I mean, they were just standing there! I even thought "For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever and ever. Amen if Rob posts a picture of the crowd, people on ETS will have fun talking how tame the pit was!" which of course wasn't true at all. For most of the show, people in the pit were very much alive, dancing, screaming, crowd surfing, climbing on each other's shoulders; and I can assure you that us folks in the seats were having a lot of fun too, at least in my section we were; I did a lot of dancing and screaming myself and I even did some head banging! My neck is still sore from that l
ol!
The Big Come Down and 31 Ghost IV gave me a whole new appreciation of that amazing guy who is Robin Finck. I loved Aaron North in NIN and I still love the guy but Finck is just perfect for NIN. What a performance he puts especially during these two songs and on another one of which I will talk about later. I'm afraid that I left that show being a die-hard Finckster fan. What a show he gave and what a great guitar player he is!
I absolutely adore the new introduction to Only. I love it so much; it's so much better than the old one! The lighting was perfect and the effects went on without a single glitch. I was watching Alessandro a lot during that song because on the Beside You In Time DVD, he does that adorable "I'm following the beat of the song with my head" movement and I wanted to see if he still does it; I don't think he did but it did not matter because I was doing it for him for the whole song!
Bush and McCain were gone for The Hand That Feeds. We had some kind of a bit bland background lighting instead of the pics but it was all right because we were very busy jumping along to the song to really be sorry that they were gone. Head Like A Hole was also very energetic, both on stage and in the audience.
I was worried that the Echoplex set-up would not work but it did. Josh got a wild round of applause when it was completed, as if he was the one who made it work properly or not! Poor Josh, he must feel so bad when it doesn't work. As the song came to an end, I noticed the green lighting above the scene and I knew, I KNEW what song was coming next.
To tell the truth, I was pretty sure Reptile was going to be played because it wasn't on the Ottawa setlist while The Wretched was. And when I realized that we were not getting The Wretched (my only disappointement of the evening) I kind of knew we were getting Reptile so when I saw those green lights, I lost it. Yes, I am not ashamed to say it, I did cry tears of pure joy while listening to that song. I've said this before but I'll say it again: there is something about that song that gets to you; it's bringing up all kind of feelings, emotions from deep down inside. You just don't listen to Reptile, you feel it; you experience it. In my very humble opinion (right!) Reptile is the best goddamn song ever written. More to that, no matter how much I love Aaron North, my opinion is that you haven't live until you have seen Robin Finck play Reptile live. He fucking owns the song. It was one of the most intense moment of the night. I will never ever forget that.
Then, Trent spoke to us. First, he introduced the band (Robin was the most cheered for band member). After that, he thanked Boris and then said: "Seriously you guys have been the best audience we've played to for as long as I can remember on this tour so thank you very much." At least, this is what I've heard that night and I think that it's mostly right. You can listed to it
here , courtesy of our own Indefinite Cure and make your own mind about it.
We got to dance one last time during God Given. That song sound so much better live than on the CD! Hurt was next and I was very anxious about it: were we going to pass the Hurt test or were we to piss off teh Rezinator? There was a bit too much screaming for my taste and I was kind of expecting a Trent Tantrum at any moment but in the end, it was all good. And no matter how many times I've heard it, the song really got to me. As did In this Twilight. It was simply gorgeous and heartbreaking, with the guys slowly leaving the stage one after the other. Yes, I cried like a baby there too.
All in all, it was a fantastic show. I am very proud that there was so much people there and that we got to show the band how much we love them. There was very minor fuck-ups during the show; Trent getting mixed-up in his lyrics again (although I can't remember on which song but it did happen, I clearly remember thinking that no show is complete without a little confusion on Trent's part), a little guitar trouble for Robin on one song (again, can't remember which one) but nothing that really messed up the show. Trent's voice help up nicely; Justin really got into some of the songs and dear God is that fro great for head banging! Josh is a machine, of course. Robin was all over the place. Alessandro was the more quiet of the band but of course, he is always hiding behind something. It really was a night I will remember forever!
It's now time for Teh Pics:
Me, I'm Not:
ZOMGWTFBBQ™ Alessandro!!! and Justin; The Great Destroyer:
Ghosts:
JOSH FREESE IS A GOD:
At the soundboard: the now famous tech who does put on a show in his own right:
In case we did not know who was playing:
In This Twilight:
1,000,000; blury Trent
Me, I'm Not from afar
The Great Destroyer
TGD Trent
TGD Robin
Ghosts
Ghosts
More blury Trent
NIN
Josh and his board
Keep in mind that I have a quite simple camera and that I don't quite know how to use it. I look and I click. Meh.
This is the link to Reptile, which I did film. Again, it is bad and you'll have to crank up the volume to hear it. I guess it's better than nothing.
Oh my beautiful liar...
And if you're thinking (or hoping) that I'll now shut up about that show, you're sorely mistaken because I'll be heading for the Random NIN Comments thread in a few moments for the more fangirlish parts of that night!
