Slipknot’s “All Hope is Gone” World Tour with special guests Coheed & Cambria and Trivium

Monday Feb. 2, 2009
Peoria, IL

The house lights were dimmed @ 7pm with Trivium ready to take the stage. “Juke Box Hero” by Foreigner was playing through the PA system and as soon as it was over the stage lights come on and Trivium starts thrashing with “Kirisute Gomen” followed by “Down from the Sky“, “Throes of Perdition“, “Like Light to the Flies“, “A Gunshot to the Head of Trepidation” and “Pull Harder on the Strings of Your Martyr“. I have seen these guys 3 times now and can say that they won’t disappoint. They definitely know how to talk to the crowd and keep them rockin.

After a short break, Coheed and Cambria took the stage and played 6 or 7 songs. I apologize for not being able to give them a review. I’m not at all a fan of this band and had a difficult time listening to them. I’ll give them an ‘A’ for effort anyways. They’re just not my cup of tea.

After Coheed exited, the red curtain was lowered around the stage, very reminiscent of the type of curtain you would find at a fancy opera type theater. It took about 45 minutes for the stage transformation to take place and as the house lights were once again dimmed, bright red lights were projected onto the cutain giving it a whole new shade of red, almost an evil shade. “Running with the Devil” from Van Halen was started at this time and as it ended, lighting from behind the curtain came on to display Slipknot’s sillouettes on the curtain. As the curtain was slowly raised, the crowd started to go crazy, and not one note had been played by the band.

Cory Taylor and the rest of the band, all sporting Slipknot’s trademark masks which were revamped for 2009, all standing proud on the stage with Joey behind his massive drum kit. Here’s where it gets totally insane and never stops. They slam right into “SIC“, “Eyeless” and “Wait and Bleed” back to back to back. I could tell at this time that this was going to be one of the best shows I have ever been to including Metallica and Korn. I forget what song was next, then came “Me Inside“, “Before I Forget” and yet another forgotten song, followed by their latest “Dead Memories“, “Left Behind“, “Disasterpiece“, “Purity“, “Everything Ends“, “Psychosocial“, “Duality“, and “People = Shit“. Of course the whole time you have the 2 percussionists in front slamming their drums and at times playing a marching snare drum while walking around the stage. The Clown out with his video camera shooting the crowd, the guitarist and bass player thrashing, and you can’t leave out the DJ’s in back doing their thing as well. Cory plays to the crowd very well. Definitely a great frontman for a band. Of course during all this mayhem there are several mosh pits, crowd surfing and even people that have torn the floor up and took the wood planks to the top of the crowd and people surfing on these.

After “People” ended, the band left the stage for a few minutes to, I’m sure, catch their breath. These guys have been busting their asses and deserved it, but they weren’t done with us just yet. Cory comes back onstage and talks with the crowd for a couple minutes when out of the blue they go right into “Surfacing” and a definite crowd favorite and their last song, “Spit it Out“. During this song as the song takes a slow down, Cory is talking to the crowd and as this is going on the crowd starts crouching down to the floor. Having never seen Slipknot before I was a little confused by this but quickly figured out what was going on. He tells the crowd to stay down until he says to ‘Jump the F*ck Up’, which the crowd complied with quite well. As all this is going on, Joey’s drumset has been raised in the air and turned 360 degrees, tilted 90 degrees as if you were looking down at him, then turned another 360 degrees in this position. Cory screams ‘Jump the F*ck Up’, the crowd does and goes absolutely crazy, the band finishes their thrashing, says thank you and exits the stage. The red curtain is then slowly lowered back in place as the house lights are turned back on.

I have to say, if you’ve never seen Slipknot before and you are any type of fan, you better go see these guys. Awesome show. It ranks in the top 5 of shows I’ve been to and I’ve been to approximately 150 shows.

This post was written by guest blogger, Brian Bundy. Thank you Brian for sharing your Slipknot concert with us. Sounds like it was a great show!

There are a few dates remaining on the All Hope Is Gone Tour. Get your tickets now!

The dates are as follows:

We do have a review of this show written by guest blogger, Brian Bundy. You can read it here.

Get your copy of “All Hope Is Gone” from Amazon today!

[tags]Slipknot, Cambria and Coheed, Trivium[/tags]