nothing can stop me now

I headed up to Cleveland with a few people yesterday to see Nine Inch Nails at Quicken Loans Arena for the first of two shows I'll be seeing this tour. Jon and I had general admission floor tickets, and we started with decent spots dead center in the middle, and about thirty feet from the rail. The opener--a local named Nicholas Megalis--started around 7:15, and NIN started playing around 8:30 (which was a welcome surprise, I was expecting them to start around 9).

NIN always puts on a great light show, and this one was the best I've seen yet. I was glad I took my camera; surprisingly I got some decent pictures and managed to avoid having my camera destroyed. I tried getting a picture during every song, but it just wasn't possible during ones like "March of the Pigs" and "Gave Up". I wasn't willing to risk having my camera broken while being shoved around.

Musically the band was tight and energetic. Trent Reznor was fantastic as always--though his reported throat problems were evident a couple times--while Josh Freese and Robin Fincke were especially amazing. There wasn't a dull song in the whole two hours of the show. Even staples like "Wish" and "Terrible Lie" were fantastic. They ended up playing mostly songs from The Slip and Year Zero, which sounded great, with a handful of older classics thrown in. I was really glad they incorporated a mini Ghosts set. It was great getting a couple less popular Downward Spiral songs like "Piggy"--which had a different feel from the album version--and "Reptile". Jon and I managed to slip to within ten feet of the front of the stage during "Wish". I'd have to say my own highlights were "Head Down," "Vessel," "Terrible Lie," "Echoplex," "Reptile," and "God Given". Oh, and Freese's drum solo on "Piggy". This also had to be the best engineered concert I've ever been to. The sound mixing was perfect; no overpowering bass, no ear-splitting highs, no vocals being drowned out by the music. At times it sounded like an actual live album mixed by an engineer in the studio. My hat goes off to the stage and sound crew.

Fantastic show by the best band out there right now. Can't wait till the Lexington show. Hopefully Trent's strained voice will hold up.


999,999
1,000,000
Letting You
Discipline
March of the Pigs
Head Down
The Frail
Closer
Gave Up
Warning
Vessel
Ghosts 5
Ghosts 25
Ghosts 19
Piggy (Ghosts version)
The Greater Good
Pinion
Wish
Terrible Lie
Survivalism
The Big Come Down
Ghosts 31
Only
Head Like a Hole

(encore)
Echoplex
Reptile
God Given
Hurt
In This Twilight

Head Down

The Warning

Ghosts 25

The Greater Good

Terrible Lie

Echoplex

In This Twilight

All of my NIN pictures can be found here.