mr. shirley manson

shirley manson commands the stage. she owns the crowd. she owns my heart, as a matter of fact. the only problem is that i think mrs. wintermute might love her as much as i do.

i've been waiting ten years to see garbage ever since i listened to their first album in dave morgenstern's basement junior year of high school. the wait was well worth it. garbage rocked the house. we had a great view, as the rain scared away a lot of the crowd at 99x's free outdoor concert downtown. however, true fans were rewarded as the thunderstorms cleared up and we enjoyed a pristine, slightly cool evening. shoobie had complained about how much the weezer concert at the underground sucked. however, we had an awesome time. close to the stage, no lines for beer, food or bathrooms, and minimal crowd stupidity (though shirley did interrupt the show to chastize two fucktards for fighting. god, she is awesome.)

the five local opening acts were just ok, with the exception of avenge vegas, who rocked out hard. their singer had this bjork-meets-seether vibe going on that i really dug.

anyway, back to the main event. shirley comes out sporting what hunter coined communist hottie chic. i started cheering right away, i think a little louder than mrs. wintermute would have liked. however, within a song or two she was a full convert in the manson fan club.

now lest you think i'm just about shirley's sex appeal...garbage is an amazing studio AND live band, which is rare. they somehow manage to translate a lot of the intricately layered and processed sounds into a great live act using two guitars, drums, bass, and a little bit of keyboards mixed in. turns out that a lot of the stuff i figured were loops and effects on the albums are actually just really creative guitars. butch vig (producer of nirvana and smashing pumpkins), known for being a bit of the svengali of garbage, is a hell of a drummer. he manages to never let his considerable technique get in the way of laying down a simple, catchy 4/4 drum beat.

i don't have the exact set list, but it's pretty close to this one from their may 17 show in chicago:
Queer, Bad Boyfriend, Supervixen, Stupid Girl, Sex Is Not The Enemy, Hammering In My Head, When I Grow Up, Vow, Bleed Like Me, I Think I'm Paranoid, Push It, Only Happy When It Rains, Why Do You Love Me, Metal Heart, Cherry Lips, Right Between The Eyes

brilliant choice to open with queer--their first single for the old school. great mix across the albums and minimal detritus from their flop of an album beautiful garbage. only songs that i really missed were 'special,' 'number one crush' and 'not my idea.' i'm really surprised that they didn't play special (by far the best song on version 2.0) but it doesn't seem to be on any of their set lists this tour.

the pictures i have didn't turn out very well, but thanks to the genius of flickr i found a great set on evan williams' page: click here for his pics.