Slipknot at the Hollywood Palladium

It would have been divine intervention to make this my 666th post but unfortunately, Slipknot barely missed the mark. The nine man outfit of Slipknot destroyed when I saw them at the Key Club many years ago prior to their slot on Ozzfest,which propelled them to top of the Heavy Metal chain. I previously caught the madness of Slipknot in March at Citizens Bank Arena in Ontario.

Vision of Disorder





It is really difficult to open for Slipknot. I don't care how fast or how hard you play. The biggest cheers you are going to get is by saying "Are you ready for Slipknot?" and "We have one more song left". Vision of Disorder definitely tried their best with metallic brand of New York hardcore. I don't remember seeing these guys back in the mid-nineties but apparently they had a decent sized cult following.

Slipknot







A 3 song limit to photograph a band with 9 members just isn't fair. So much chaos is unfolding on the stage that it is difficult not to get some sort of crazy Slipknot shot. Slipknot doesn't pull an punches by opening with some older material to get the crowd going by gouging out "Eyeless" and the bruising riffs of "Wait and Bleed".

Slipknot dives into thrash punk territory with the brutally repetitive "Get This" with the Clown jumping off his drum riser and making his way through the crowd to incite some more chaos. "Before I Forget" was another unrelenting attack on the senses as Jim Root (Guitars) was crushing riff after riff on his custom artist signature Fender Telecaster. Mick Thompson was keeping up the accelerated riffing pace with his own custom artist signature Ibanez guitar.

Slipknot would finally visit their new material by uncorking the odorous "Sulfur" from their latest album All Hope is Gone. The new material kept coming with "Dead Memories" which somehow reminded me of old Metallica. A return to thrash occurred with the raucous "Psychosocial". The main set came to a crushing end with "Duality and "People=Shit".

A churning rendition of "Snuff" kicked off their encore. "Spit It Out" had the tried and true request for all members of the crowd to sit down on the ground and jump up simultaneously on Corey's vocal cue. I have seen this throughout out the years and admit it looks cool from the sidelines but I think they would have let this go by now.

One other notable event was that long time Heavy Metal concert photographer Neil Zlozower was shooting the show in the photo pit and Shawn Crahan took the camera from him and snapped some pictures of Neil which was pretty hilarious. I don't think I would have given my camera to any member of Slipknot, so I commend Neil on his bravery.

Slipknot setlist at the Hollywood Palladium (10/29/09)
"(Sic)"
"Eyeless"
"Wait and Bleed"
"Get This"
"Before I Forget"
"Sulfur"
"The Blister Exists"
"Dead Memories"
"Disasterpiece"
"Vermillion"
"Psychosocial"
"Duality"
"People=Shit"
"Snuff"
"Surfacing"
"Spit It Out"