Opening up with a trio of Broken cuts (“Wish,” “Last,” and “Happiness in Slavery”), the band were shrouded in smoke. This new austerity was a good look for them: It matched the loose, chaotic energy of recent NIN records like Bad Witch. The Cold and Black and Infinite Tour stage looked a lot more spartan and desolate than the gleaming, high-tech setup the band used for their 2013 Tension Tour at Talking Stick. It was a casual setup: a ring of lighting rigs and a gray, worn screen hanging in the background. Jacob Tyler Dunn After they wrapped up their set, NIN’s stage was thrown together. Even their poppiest numbers were drenched in sharp peals of noise. Hearing songs like “Some Candy Talking” and “Head On” in person was revelatory: All the noise that they couldn’t get on tape came pouring out of the amps. Even classic LPs like Psychocandy and Darklands sound quiet compared to most other feedback-friendly rock music (the only recording to catch the band’s stabbing-you-in-the-fucking-ear live energy is their debut single, the cacophonous “Upside Down”). Opening up with “Reverence,” Jim Reid sneered about wanting to die like Jesus Christ while his brother William and the rest of the band cut loose with their feedback-laced brand of alternative rock.ĭespite the band’s legendary reputation for being noise polluters of the highest order, most of their records sound pretty tame. Noise-rock legends The Jesus and Mary Chain didn’t disappoint. But when those screens are shrunk down to the size of bathroom mirrors, his show loses its power to derange the senses. Anyone who’s seen Tobacco at venues like Crescent Ballroom know that the AV element is a big part of his show his music paired up with a big screen flashing a steady stream of nightmarish and hilarious images can make for a hallucinatory experience. Tobacco played a banging electronic set, finishing off with a warped and robotic cover of Eric Carmen's schmaltzy '80s tune “Hungry Eyes.” Flanking his table were a pair of circular screens, on which projections of bizarre video clips and freaky horror films played. Reznor’s off-the-cuff moment of vulnerability embodied the strange mood of the night: It was equal parts triumphant and sad, brutally noisy and just plain brutal.īefore NIN took the stage, they had Tobacco and The Jesus and Mary Chain open for them. It wouldn’t be the first or last time Bowie would haunt the show: his mournful Low instrumental “Warszawa” played as part of the preshow music, and Reznor followed his untidy speech with a fierce rendition of “I’m Afraid Of Americans” (a spotlight moment for longtime NIN touring guitarist Robin Finck, who got to close out the song with a short and nasty solo). Talking about the passage of time and the loss of friends, there was genuine sadness and resignation in Reznor’s voice. After playing an ambient soundscape dedicated to David Bowie, Reznor reflected on his friend and mentor’s passing on the mic. “This is one of those speeches that doesn’t necessarily go anywhere and have a tidy resolution,” Reznor said with a kind of weary, wry self-awareness. But there was one moment in the evening where the man of few words suddenly got verbose. Aside from the occasional “Thank you,” Reznor saved his voice for crooning and shouting his way out of the din roaring around him. For most of NIN’s September 13 set at Comerica Theatre, the debut performance of their Cold and Black and Infinite Tour, the quintet onstage approached their set like they were The Ramones: next to no talking, one song bashed out after another, every amp cranked to the max.
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