_J_A_Y_

This was Tool show #25 for me, and definitely one of the best! The new stage visuals are AWESOME (stop reading if you want to be surprised).

First of all, I now understand why some folks claim the Gorge is the most beautiful venue in the country – it is akin to having a concert on the edge of the Grand Canyon – very pretty.

Shortly after an amazing sunset, Isis played and awesome and punctual set from 8:00 to 8:30 exactly. The first clues of Tool’s new stage show came as the Isis set was being broken down. Black mats were being taken off the stage to reveal a totally white floor, stage and even some of the amps. It was like I woke up in Wonderland! Of note were the 4 foot high screens that lined the entire back of the stage to form a 50 foot wide collection of rear-projected video screens. I noticed later that the video sometimes made these screens act independently (to show the same video on every screen) or in conjunction with others to form bigger screens – sometimes one big wide screen. There was also projection from above down, as was done on the Lateralus stage, but now onto the white stage to give a very bright look. All of the white and bright made everyone, particularly Maynard, more in the spotlight than previous stage setups. Even the stage techs had on white lab coats to keep with the theme. Oh ya, and Justin had on a really cool Jimi Hendrix shirt.

The stage evolved too! For the last few songs, starting with Lateralus, 3 disc screens with lights came down from above and various stings of lights went up from the back of the stage. It was quite a stunning sight to see! Very nice indeed. There were also lasers in use for the end of the show: mostly green lasers but one red and one blue. There were some cool shapes being projected onto the stage floor, and when the smoke wasn’t clearing too fast you could see the effects in the air as well. But in my opinion, the lasers added very little – it was all in the video and lights for me (from a visual perspective).

Now that I’ve commented at length on the visuals, I have to say that it is the sound and watching these fine musicians that usually is the most important thing to me by far. I was very pleased in this way too! A few of the songs were performed better and with more emotion (to me) than any of the other shows I’ve seen (or my memory is fading). Certainly this was the best of the 3 shows I’ve seen this year (Coachella and Fresno being the others). The sound quality of the amphitheater was excellent! We were in the reserved seats.

Some great surprises for me: I love the song Opiate, especially live, and hearing it last night brought me to a place I haven’t felt at a show for a while. Fucking awesome! The added keyboard bit was very cool too!

I have said in the past that Schism is a great piece of work that I don’t appreciate as much as other folks tend to. That was not the case tonight. In the middle part they did an extended double time bit where Adam and Justin came together to get it right. Fun to watch and hear.

Rosetta Stoned was fucking incredible and, to me, a totally different experience from the Fresno show. Not only was the sound much better, but it really seemed like the band was on and into it. Maynard left the stage for the Lost Keys part, and when he came back on armed with his megaphone and doing his fast-speak gibberish, he was wondering around the stage picking stuff up and cleaning the stage! He spent the first two minutes of the song making sure that stage was spic and span. It seemed like he was in character, or perhaps he was just being anal. But my buddy and I looked at each other and laughed at this spectacle. I love to watch Danny shred the shit out of his drum kit, it blows me away every show.

There were a few other places where new keyboard was added – sometimes played by Adam (using a keyboard or foot pedals) and sometimes by Maynard. Danny too does keyboard stuff now and again, but this is all stuff from the album.

My only complaint was the awful line to get to the parking lot and the worse line to get out – it took us over an hour, sucking exhaust the whole time. A small price to pay, I suppose.

What a great show, glad I’m going to see them 3 more times in the next 2 weeks ☺