Anticipated Voice

What a weekend. I’ll recap that in another post. This post is all about Friday night. Soundgarden concert. My most anticipated concert in a very long time.

How was it? Fan-fucking-tastic. They played songs from all their albums, and they nailed them all. They played tons of my favorite songs, and even played a couple that I was not expecting. Drawing flies was the first one. On the album it is a fast paced song with non stop singing. Live it was off the hook. When the song was done Ben Shepherd (the bassist) bumped fists with Matt Cameron (the drummer). They knew they nailed that one, the other song that I never expected to hear live was Born on the Fourth of July. When they started playing that, I nearly lost my mind.

They just kept playing and playing too. They played for over two hours before they left the stage.

Chris Cornell’s voice was outstanding too. He was hitting, and holding, all the high notes in all the songs they played. The biggest example of this was during Ugly Truth. Sounded so awesome.

The light show was awesome too. There were some very cool projections on the backdrop that were animated at times. The light bars would get reconfigured between songs, so it always seemed new and different. The backdrop animations for Drawing Flies was fast paced and chaotic, matching the song perfectly.

Rusty Cage, Jesus Christ Pose, Slaves and Bulldozers, Spoonman, Gun, Loud Love, Beyond the Wheel, Outshined, and a whole lot more.

In case you can’t tell, I had a great time at the show. I would have loved to have heard some new material though, that would have been killer.

We missed the first opening band, but it sounds like I didn’t miss all that much anyway. Queens of the Stone Age were good. I definitely enjoyed their set, but they seemed a little subdued.

At the end of the encore when the lights came up, I was happy that I was there and had seen the show, but sad it was over.

The setlist:

  • Searching With My Good Eye Closed
  • Spoonman
  • Gun
  • Jesus Christ Pose
  • Blow Up the Outside World
  • The Day I Tried to Live
  • My Wave
  • Burden in My Hand
  • Ugly Truth
  • Fell on Black Days
  • Loud Love
  • Drawing Flies
  • Black Hole Sun
  • Outshined
  • Rusty Cage
  • Superunknown
  • 4th of July
  • Encore:

  • Beyond the Wheel
  • Mailman
  • Slaves & Bulldozers

via setlist.fm

Reasons Acoustic

I am looking forward to this album.
I have a bunch of concert bootlegs and I love Soundgarden’s live music. I’ve also seen them live in Vancouver, which is one of the reasons I am can’t wait for this album (look at track 6).

1. Spoonman
2. Searching With My Good Eye Closed
3. Let Me Drown
Tracks 1-3: Recorded live at Crosby Hall, Del Mar Fairgrounds, Del Mar, CA – November 30, 1996
4. Head Down
Recorded live at Mercer Arena, Seattle, WA – December 18, 1996
5. Outshined
Recorded live at Crosby Hall, Del Mar Fairgrounds, Del Mar, CA – November 30, 1996
6. Rusty Cage
Recorded live at Pacific National Exhibition Forum, Vancouver, BC, Canada – December 7, 1996
7. Burden In My Hand
Recorded live at Salem Armory, Salem, OR – December 8, 1996
8. Helter Skelter
9. Boot Camp
Tracks 8 and 9: Recorded live at Crosby Hall, Del Mar Fairgrounds, Del Mar, CA – November 30, 1996
10. Nothing To Say
Recorded live at Mercer Arena, Seattle, WA – December 18, 1996
11. Slaves And Bulldozers
12. Dusty
13. Fell On Black Days
Tracks 11-13: Recorded live at Henry J. Kaiser Convention Center, Oakland, CA – December 5, 1996
14. Search And Destroy
Recorded live at Mercer Arena, Seattle, WA – December 18, 1996

15. Ty Cobb
Recorded live at Crosby Hall, Del Mar Fairgrounds, Del Mar, CA – November 30, 1996

16. Black Hole Sun
Recorded live at Mercer Arena, Seattle, WA – December 17, 1996
17. Jesus Christ Pose
Recorded live at Henry J. Kaiser Convention Center, Oakland, CA – December 5, 1996

I’m also really looking forward to when Chris Cornell visits Victoria in late April for a solo acoustic show. That will be pretty amazing I think. The tickets I got are pretty awesome too. About tenth row, centre stage.