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Alice Cooper setlist: School’s Out, No More Mr. Nice Guy, I’m Eighteen, Wicked Young Man, Ballad Of Dwight Fry, Go To Hell, Guilty, Cold Ethyl, Poison, From The Inside, Nurse Rozetta, Be My Lover, Only Women Bleed, I Never Cry, Black Widow Jam, Vengeance Is Mine, Dirty Diamonds, Billion Dollar Babies, Killer, I Love The Dead, Elected, Under My Wheels.

Nurse Rozetta:

Elected:

The show was pretty great just with Alice, but then the night got even better. Again, this was my first time seeing Rob Zombie, so I didn’t quite know what to expect. What I got was a huge video screen behind the drummer (who for this tour was none other than Slipknot’s Joey Jordison!), and smaller LED-looking screens in front of the drum riser, amp stacks, and stage monitors. All of which were used to great effect throughout the set. Each mic stand was an elaborate skeleton, Rob’s in particular. The video boards were all used for classic and campy horror movie clips interspersed with other graphics that had the effect of being on some “carnival ride of doom”. Visually stunning, to say the least! After an intro jam, Superbeast was the first song, and that really set the tone for the rest of the set. As if all those visuals weren’t enough, motorized robots started driving around on the stage, some of which were spewing smoke! In addition to his solo stuff (Living Dead Girl, Scum of the Earth, Never Gonna Stop, House of 1000 Corpses, etc.), he also played the two biggest White Zombie tunes in Thunder Kiss ’65 and More Human Than Human. During Thunder Kiss, guitarist John 5 did an extended solo while Rob ran up one of the aisles, all the way up onto the lawn, then back down the aisle on the opposite side! Jordison got a drum solo, and wasn’t mentioned by name, rather being referred to as “The Ghost of Michael Jackson”. For the encore, we got a fake trailer for a movie called “Werewolf Women of the S.S.” before a performance of the song of the same name, and the closer was Dragula. Much like Alice Cooper’s set, this was FUN. Loud, driving, and fun. I can’t really describe it any better than that!

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More Human Than Human:

Dragula:

It had been 7 years, almost to the day (5/2/03), since Pearl Jam had been in Buffalo, and thus, that long since I’d seen them live. After some day-before scrambling for people, Tom and Nikki took my original 300-level tickets, and I joined Dave down wherever his fan-club lottery tickets would place us. Which turned out to be Sec. 117, Row 13. Which was two rows lower, and three seats over from where Tiff and I were in ’03. So essentially, I saw the two shows from the exact same spot! We got in during set change, so no Band of Horses for us. The capacity crowd roared as the guys took the stage, and then opened with Unthought Known, which according to setlist.fm was the first time they’d ever opened with it. My first real highlights were Animal, the Small Town singalong, and then No Way (8th time ever!). Needless to say, the crowd was loud and proud the whole way through the show, which continued with a good spread, including Not For You, Got Some, and they closed the first set with Betterman.

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The first encore included a take on Fatal (4th time ever!), which was one of my favorite b-sides from Lost Dogs, so I was thrilled to hear that, followed not soon after by Spin The Black Circle, and an awesome take on Rearviewmirror. The second encore was fantastic from start to finish, with Once, Alive, Fuckin’ Up and the traditional closer Yellow Ledbetter. While nowhere near as long or as epic of a show as in ’03, Pearl Jam gave us a pretty good setlist, a great time, a great show, and hopefully it won’t be seven years before they come back again!

Set List: Unthought Known, Severed Hand, Animal, The Fixer, Small Town, No Way, Given To Fly, Light Years, Even Flow, Amongst The Waves, Unemployable, Grievance, Not For You, Got Some, Do The Evolution, Wasted Reprise, Better Man/Save It For Later. 1st encore: Just Breathe, Fatal, Last Kiss, Spin the Black Circle, Rearviewmirror. 2nd encore: Once, Alive, Fuckin’ Up, Yellow Ledbetter.

I arrived at the Town Ballroom, and nailed down a spot on the 2nd tier to the left of the stage. Walter Schreifels was on first, and I confess at the outset, I wasn’t sure what to expect. Knowing of his Gorilla Biscuits / Quicksand / Rival Schools pedigree, seeing him come out with an acoustic guitar took me aback for a second. He played a variety of different stuff, including a Rival Schools song, some of his own solo stuff, and even an acoustic take on “Start Today”. Very Cool.

The Cancer Bats were up next, and they made the most of their time. The Toronto-based band mixes punk, metal, sludge and a couple other genres into their style, which to my unfamiliar ear sounded like Down and Every Time I Die (whom they’re touring with this summer), among others. It was a fairly entertaining set, punctuated with a cover of the Beastie Boys’ “Sabotage”.

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Next up, Sick of it All. Hardcore legends in their own right, they’ve been around since 1986, releasing material all the while. It was a treat to see them, and it was a treat to see a good deal of the crowd as into them as they’d be for Snapcase. (Not surprising, I figured there’d be a lot of crossover fans.) A very energetic set from them, and the crowd was equally energetic. Certainly something to see.

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Finally, it was time for Snapcase. The crowd roared, the band came out, and away we went. Easily transitioning from album to album, the pacing of the set was perfect. High energy right out of the gate with Coagulate, coming down a bit with the more subdued tunes like Ten A.M., then ramping right back up. I’m sure some super die-hard fans might have wanted to hear a couple different songs, but I was quite happy with everything they played, especially Zombie Prescription, as that’s always been my favorite Snapcase song. They closed out the main set with Caboose, and then for the encore came what I’ve always thought was the quintessential Snapcase song, Incarnation. They stayed with that album for the last song of the night, playing the title track, lookinglasself. I don’t know what to say about the show other than it was awesome. They sounded perfect, the crowd on the floor gave back just as much energy, just awesome to watch. Lou Koller from Sick of it All came out to help on Energy Dome! I know I had a great time, and I’m pretty sure all the die-hards went home just as happy. I hope it’s a little less than five years between shows for them, and a lot less than 9 years between shows for me!
Setlist: Coagulate, Bleeding Orange, Cognition, Aperture, New Kata, She Suffocates, Harrison Bergeron, Ten A.M., Typecast Modulator, Interrogation, Ambition Now, Zombie Prescription, Drain Me, Energy Dome, Exile Etiquette, Caboose. Encore: Incarnation, lookinglasself.

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Energy Dome (w/ Lou from SOIA):

And what a wedding it was. A beautiful ceremony just off the 10th hole of the Island Course (did I mention Dave and Michaela are avid golfers?!) saw the happy couple tie the knot (of which I took no pictures. Booooo.). The reception took place outside, behind the Island clubhouse, around the pool. An awesome setting, with awesome people. And awesome food, naturally. (The pasta station was To. Die. For. That good.) Ben kept the party rockin’ all night, some of the families’ little nephews cut a rug on the dance floor, a couple eager guests jumped into the pool a little later on, and yours truly even tossed off a Jump Around at the behest of the newlyweds! We had a blast at the reception, gave Dave and Michaela the first tram back to their place while a bunch of us hoofed it across the resort back to the other clubhouse for a nightcap. Good times.

Sunday was a lazy morning, and quite the wet one. The rain held off for us Friday and Saturday, but Sunday was quite rainy. Back to the clubhouse for breakfast brunch, where we ended up eating with Dave, Michaela, and Dave’s brother Chuck with his wife Amy. Very nice to see them one more time before they departed for their honeymoon! Tiff and I packed up, checked out, and rolled down the road a bit to the mall to kill some time, as our flight wasn’t until 8pm. Had to go all the way to Tampa to find a mall with an ice rink in it! We actually came back to the resort and hung out with TK and the crew for a bit before we made an excursion to Tarpon Springs. Tarpon is apparently the sponge capital of Florida, if not the world, and are known for their sponge docks. We visited the Tarpon Springs Aquarium, where we caught a couple of the little shows, watched one of the girl helpers feed an alligator (and almost fed it her hand!), and fed some Rays ourselves. Since the population is almost exclusively Greek, there’s a ton of Greek bakeries and restaurants in the area. We stopped into Hella’s Bakery and enjoyed some “dessert”. Walked around a little more, saw some of the shops, and said goodbye to the rest of the crew. We ventured back to the resort one last time to pick up Maggie, headed to the airport, dropped off the car, and flew home.
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A fun-filled weekend for sure, spent with good friends, and a wedding to boot! Dave and Michaela put on a fine party for us, and here’s to a long and happy marriage to the both of them!

Marching out to the familiar strains of “K-I-C-K-A-S-S… That’s the way we spell success!”, the band launched in to Giant, and kept the high tempo with The Future is X-Rated. Either Matt is sick of playing the older “hits” or varies the setlist a bit, because the set was very heavy on Beautiful Midnight and Hospital Music tunes, yet only playing two songs off of the new “Vancouver” disc and nothing off of Audio of Being or White Light… and only one Underdogs and Avalanche tune each. Despite all that, Matt sounded great, the band was in fine form, and the crowd was very much into the show. Almost every song had a big sing-along, particularly Hello Time Bomb and Apparitions. Hearing a lot of the Beautiful Midnight tracks really transported me back to that 2001 show (which was on that tour), and as usually happens with me, songs from the newer albums that I could take or leave in their recorded forms took on a new life, and I found a new appreciation for them (particularly the closer, Champions of Nothing). I was very happy I had the chance to see MG again, and in Buffalo with an appreciative and knowledgeable crowd.

Champions of Nothing

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Setlist: Giant, The Future Is X-Rated, Great Whales of the Sea, Hello Time Bomb, Load Me Up, Born Losers, I’m A Window, Odette, Apparitions, Weapon. Encore: A Single Explosion, Last Parade, Champions of Nothing.

I drove down from work, met up with Phill, we got our tickets, got inside, and headed upstairs to the balcony to grab some beverages and say hi to Karl and Kelley. We made our way down to our (tenth row, left side) seats and anxiously waited for the fun to begin. It was kinda surreal to know exactly what was going to be played, in what order, just like the album. And for me, Clumsy was the beginning of the OLP love affair, having seen five shows on that tour, and knowing the songs inside and out. On this night, OLP didn’t disappoint. The lights came down, the band walked out, and the Riv exploded. Superman’s Dead obviously got the place into the show immediately, and then Automatic Flowers (which was the opener for most of those shows) put me right back into 1998. Raine went on to mention that Carnival was one of the first songs they wrote for the album where they felt like they were breaking away from the sound on Naveed, and Big Dumb Rocket hit the spot as well. He also told the story about how he never thought 4AM would see the light of day on the record, as it was too personal. After Shaking, there was the epic singalong for Clumsy, and next I recalled how much I always liked hearing Hello Oskar in the live setting. Let You Down has always been my least favorite song on the album, but it sounded as good on this night as any of the rest of them, and Story of 100 Aisles I don’t believe I’d EVER heard live, not even during the Clumsy tours. The capper was Car Crash, and Raine hit *the* note. The band sounded great, Raine’s voice was great in spots, good for the vast majority of the show, and there was only a couple wayward notes that I could discern. Honestly, they probably could have sounded terrible and I wouldn’t have cared nor noticed, because I was just too caught up in the fact that they were playing songs I hadn’t seen them perform in 10-12 years, if ever! And the best part? A second set!

After reminiscing about this show and past shows during the intermission with Mary, Katie, and a couple others, it was time for the rest of the show. The second set opened with Monkey Brains, which is one of the aforementioned new songs that really grew on me. The crowd participation was back in full effect for Innocent and Life, and came to a crescendo with Is Anybody Home? (For some reason I jotted this song down as Happiness and the Fish, don’t ask me why. Wasn’t thinking straight by this point.) and One Man Army. They brought the crowd back down with two of the more subdued new tracks (Paper Moon and Escape Artist), but yanked us right back up with Somewhere Out There, followed by Naveed. They ended the main set with the first Burn Burn single, which was All You Did Was Save My Life. We didn’t have to wait too long for an encore, which is good because I don’t think most people in the crowd had much of any voice left to cheer anyway. What little we did have was spent screaming along to Starseed, which unsurprisingly brought the house down. I don’t think anyone left disappointed, as these songs sounded just as good as the Clumsy set did. I know I left with a huge smile on my face. An immensely satisfying show, for any number of reasons, but mostly because it made me remember all the times and all the shows that made me love this band in the first place. Show number 16 echoed show number 1 in a way, but stands on its own merits just as well.

Is Anybody Home?

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1. Superman’s Dead
2. Automatic Flowers
3. Carnival
4. Big Dumb Rocket
5. 4 A.M.
6. Shaking
7. Clumsy
8. Hello Oskar
9. Let You Down
10. The Story of 100 Aisles
11. Car Crash

Set 2
12. Monkey Brains
13. Innocent
14. Life
15. Is Anybody Home?
16. One Man Army
17. Paper Moon
18. Escape Artist
19. Somewhere Out There
20. Naveed
21. All You Did Was Save My Life
Encore:
22. Starseed

Just down the road to our next stop, Ravines, where the winemaker expanded upon our cork knowledge by explaining that natural cork is still the way to go if you’re going to age the wines, and while he doesn’t use them, synthetic corks and screw caps are fine for wines you’ll be drinking right away. It’s all about the application I suppose!

Around the bottom end of the lake, and next stop was Heron Hill, where we easily had the most excitable host of the day, as evidence by the exclamation point on his nametag (Dave!), but he was also very knowledgeable. Dr. Frank’s was next, and we closed up our tour day with a stop at Hunt Country. I think Tiff and I have found some new favorite wines and wineries, and we’ll certainly do Keuka Lake again in the future.

Naturally, we were starving at this point, so we bid farewell to Dave, and the rest of us went to pig out at Papa Jack’s for dinner. Yeah, pig out. GARBAGE PLATE TIME. Totally hit the spot. Good plate too. The wine, combined with the plate, led to food-coma time when we got home (for me anyway). Conked out on the couch, and that was it for my night. Needless to say I’m a bit more refreshed this morning!

Phill and I made our way down the 90 to the Ballroom, and walked as the stage was just getting set for God Forbid. We hung back on the top level to take in their half-hour set, which was probably the best place for us. I’d seen God Forbid open up for Soulfly back in ’05 at the Icon, and while I liked them enough then, this time around I wasn’t totally impressed. I can’t even really describe it, as there wasn’t anything really wrong with their set, and the songs were okay, but the whole package was just kinda, “eh”. Didn’t really grab my interest much.

Phill and I moved down to the floor for Shadows Fall, and having seen them in Syracuse in October, I was expecting good things. And I got good things! They came out to the recorded “Path To Imminent Ruin” intro, and ripped into My Demise. The set continued along at a great pace, mixing stuff from the new Retribution disc and The War Within, an older tune from Art of Balance, and interestingly, nothing from Threads of Life. Which was fine, because King of Nothing was still in the set, and they did an awesome cover of Ozzy’s Bark At The Moon (as it’s one of the bonus tracks on the new album). Definitely had the energy level on high for the whole set, and even though guitarist Matt Bachand told me at the merch table that they had some sound issues, I thought they sounded better than Syracuse. The whole band was into the set, into the crowd, and there was a good amount of people in the crowd giving it back to them. Fun, fun, fun!
Shadows Fall setlist: The Path to Imminent Ruin, My Demise, Thoughts Without Words, Still I Rise, What Drives The Weak, King of Nothing, Inspiration On Demand, A Public Execution, Bark At The Moon, The Light That Blinds.
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We retreated up to the middle level all the way to the right for FFDP. We had a perfect vantage point to see the _packed_ floor (the show sold out!) as the band came out. Do these guys ever know how to capitvate a crowd! The set was very similar to the Syracuse show, opening with Burn It Down into The Way Of The Fist. Lead singer Ivan Moody was very interactive with the crowd, and sounded quite appreciative of the crowd response. The one new song in the set, No One Gets Left Behind, was impressive, as was the singalong on Bad Company. During the middle of White Knuckles, Ivan brought up two little kids on stage (one was 9, one was 12) and showed them off as “the future of heavy metal fans”. He dropped an f-bomb during his little speech, and mentioned how he has a self-imposed fine with his daughter, such that he pays a dollar every time he swears. So he implored the fans to pay his fine for him, asking for two dollars. I think the kids ended up with about 10 bucks apiece by the end of it! They got to stay up on stage through the end of the song, and now have a freakin’ awesome concert memory! A couple of songs later, while introducing Dying Breed, Ivan mentioned how he wanted to meet every person on the floor, encouraging the crowd surfers to come to the front, while imploring both the security at the barrier to take care of the fans and the fans themselves to respect the security guards. Pretty cool in my book, and it worked, because no one got stupid with it! Rather surprising, and there was only one idiot who tried to get on stage, and quickly got shut down in that endeavor. Naturally, the one song encore was The Bleeding, and the crowd ate it up. FFDP sounded better than Syracuse also, and again, the band/crowd interaction was great to see. My lone complaint still holds: the set was too short. More songs guys! MORE SONGS! But overall, another excellent show by the Death Punch crew.

FFDP setlist: Burn it Down, Salvation, The Way of the Fist, Hard to See, No One Gets Left Behind, Bad Company, White Knuckles, Never Enough, Dying Breed, Meet the Monster. Encore: The Bleeding.

View at Picasa Five Finger Death Punch @ Buffalo Town Ballroom 2010-02-1111-Feb-2010 22:07, Apple iPhone 3G, 2.8

View at Picasa Me and Brian Fair from Shadows Fall Shadows Fall @ Buffalo Town Ballroom 2010-02-1111-Feb-2010 23:13, Apple iPhone 3G, 2.8