Mudvayne

Last night Darian and I went ot Mudvayne at EarthLink Live. The show was sold out, but one of the benefits of working at EarthLink paid off. EarthLink corporate gets a handful of free tickets to every show at EarthLive so I did a little research and was able to get a couple of complimentary tickets for the show.

Darian and I got to the show about 7:00pm. Pretty much the scheduled start time. One of the bands, American Head Charge, had their bus break down so the show started a little later to accomodate the missing set.

We got inside and got a nice seat about 5 rows off of the floor. Darian wanted to live the concert so she went down to the floor, and I was quite content sitting back in my chair and watching and listening to the show.

Before the first band went on I checked out the merch booth and found out Mudvayne was doing an aftershow autograph of their new disc if you bought it. Since Darian is no longer a kid I ended up buying to copies, not to mention I already owned it so now we've got three copies of the disc.

First band was Bloodsimple. Out of New York and along the lines of the new metal scene. More hard core than progressive, more power than dynamics. Singer's voice was a little too cookie monster for me, but the music was good and the band was tight.

Second band was Life Of Agony. Also out of New York, and a band with some history. Vocalist Whitfield Crane from Ugly Kid Joe joined them briefly in the late 90s'. This was a reunited lineup from the early 90s and the music went over well. Darian commented that they were a little more commercial sounding than the first band.

Mudvayne came out and played a great set. I saw them previously on September 10,2001 the day before the dreaded 9-11. Ironically the night I saw them, absolute esacpe-ism. The band were decked out in full makeup, actually with bullet holes to their head just like they were to the MTV VMAs that year, actually just a few days prior. They played an outdoor venue which is always odd to me for this type of metal show. It happened to be at the end of the first tour so Chad's (at that time Kud's) vocals were pretty shot, and the band didn't really have as strong a catalog to pull from. Putting together an hour plus show for an album that was only 50 minutes without the interludes between songs prooved tough. I really enjoyed that show but was pleased to see how far they've come since. Ironically 9-11 was about the time they took off the makeup for good. I don't know if it was simply coincidence or not but the escapism is now less about the theatrics and more about the music.

Now back to the show in Atlanta. Fantastic set. Unlike the Austin show in 2001 they now have 3 great albums and for me their debut LD 50 is the weakest of the three. They opened the set with Determined and proceeded to run through a farily even set incorporating songs off the three major label releases.

In no particular order here is the set list I was able to cobble together.
Determined
Silenced
Internal Primates Forever
Happy?
Death Blooms
IMN
-1
Nothing To Gein
Mercy, Severity
World So Cold
Not Falling
Dig

Highlights for me were Determined, Happy?, and World So Cold. Chad's voice sounded fantastic on the melodic parts and the screaming never disappointed. I remember when World So Cold came out as a single about 18 months back, they were promoting it on tv and also released a live bootleg. I was disappointed with the performances, the band looked exhausted, and the music and vocals weren't up to the standard I was hoping. Last night World So Cold blew away any previous disappointments. Chad did a little let's hear it for our troops speech right before the song, with the main message being just because stuff isn't in your backyard doesn't mean it doesn't happen.

Dig closed the night and although that was the song that gave 90% of the crowd their first exposure to Mudvayne it almost seems like it doesn't stand up to the newer material. I'm hoping Happy? takes this band from bringing in gold records to finally crossing into the platinum.

The aftershow was non-eventful. No pictures and you could only get one item signed. I asked Matt what drum pedals he uses and he said Pearl. No longer the Tama iron cobras, that I still play to this day. Ryan was extremely nice to Darian. As Darian had her cd signed she said "Thank you so very much" to which his reply was "You're welcome so very much". She defintely got a kick out of this. Gregg signed looked at me I said thanks and he didn't really say anything. And then Chad at the end actually reached out and waited for me to shake his hand. He was a true class act.

I'll post some pics from the show, and scans of the autographs and aftershow pass shortly.

It had been too long since I had been to a great metal show. Different than the 80s and 90s but a great experience nonetheless.