Tuesday, April 12, 2011

Queens of the Stone Age, April 12 at the Wiltern

I’ve been a fan of Queens of the Stone Age because they’re one of the best straight-ahead rock bands around but their sound seemed to just get weird instead of heavy post-Songs for the Deaf, after Nick left/got kicked out, and I started to drift away. I still get the albums and still hold out hope that they can return to something like that old sound but I think I really liked them for Nick. I hadn’t gotten ahold of their first album but Andrew always told me it was amazing. Carla and Cid are huge fans so we got tickets for this show. As it turns out, they were playing that entire first album, which is probably their heaviest but without Nick, who was clearly the one that brought the heavy elements to the music. Still a good show, and that version of the band is probably the tightest that Josh has had, but I was a little lost, especially with Carla right next to me shouting along to every word. She said that it’s an album for stoners so she’s not sure how much I would like it. It’s always a special thing to see a band perform one of their seminal albums, especially an obscure one (and one which didn't get a wide release until years and years after the band got big), though odd that I saw the performance before ever hearing the album they were playing (or anything from it, aside for a few cuts they played live). After that they encored with a smattering of their more recent, non-Nick stuff, and it came across, amazingly, heavier than it was weird. Hearing those songs live, I could even really warm up to the newer stuff. Maybe I’ll become a post-Nick QOTSA fan after all. I might even have to go back to the beginning, during the early-Nick years. Weird and heavy can be hard to balance, and we may have to pick one or the other anymore, but at least sometimes we can get a glimpse back.

Queens of the Stone Age's set-list:
"Regular John"
"Avon"
"If Only"
"Walkin' on the Sidewalks"
"You Would Know"
"How to Handle a Rope"
"Mexicola"
"Hispanic Impressions"
"The Bronze"
"Give the Mule What He Wants
"I Was a Teenage Hand Model"
"You Can't Quit Me Baby"

"Someone's in the Wolf"
"Little Sister"
"Make It Wit Chu"
"Hangin' Tree"
"Tangled Up in Plaid"

"Sick, Sick, Sick"
"Go With the Flow"

e Flow"

2 comments:

lolly352 said...

I think what I said was the self-titled QOTSA album is a lot closer to the stoner rock that Josh was doing in Kyuss. You certainly don't have to be a stoner to love it. I promise one of these days I will find that album for you!

mar said...

After how long I've had this blog up, I finally get a comment!