Prepare For Hell Tour
Omaha, Nebraska
Century Link Center
November 6th, 2014
Slipknot, Korn, King 810
Was Omaha prepared for Hell? Without a doubt! Tonight would be a night to remember.
It’s been almost 5 years to the day since Slipknot last played Omaha proper, the last time being November 1st, 1999 at Sokol Auditorium during the band’s Livin La Vida Loco tour with then label mates Coal Chamber. Even though it’s only been a few years since Slipknot debuted Knotfest a few short miles from Omaha’s city limits, tonight’s show would be one for the history books. It would be the first time many of the 7500 fans would be seeing Iowa’s Lords of Metal, and the twentieth time I’ve seen Slipknot live, and my tenth seeing Korn.
Walking into the massive Century Link Center, the initial buzz from the fans was about seeing KING 810. As the house lights went out, the crowd burst to life. KING 810 walked on stage greeted by a few thousand screaming fans. Having already toured Europe, playing in front of thens of thousands of fans for Download 2014, The U.S.’s ROck on the Range, and this past summer’s Mayhem Festival, KING 810 know how to prime a crowd. With the arena’s capacity swelling, the band ripped into a high energy six song set, featuring tracks off of their Roadrunner Records debut “Memoirs of a Murderer”. Even though I’m not a fan of the lyrical content of the songs and inspiration behind KING 810’s music, these 4 men from Flint, Michigan know how to put on a live show. The band’s energy was matched ounce for ounce by tthe crowd. Being a relatively new band, and this eing their first time in Omaha, I wasn’t surprised to see the majority of the crowd focused on the band’s brutal style of metal music instead of singing along with vocalist David Gunn. KING 810 made sure that Omaha was prepared for the musical Hell that awaited us.
Setlist:
810
Killem All
Murder Murder Murder
Desperate Lovers
Treading and Trodden
War Outside
Fat Around the Heart
It didn’t take long for the stage crew to tear down KING 810’s gear and set up for Korn. The last piece of the set, Davis’ Geiger created microphone stand, wrapped in a sheet, was placed center stage. The crowd knew exactly what it was, and burst into cheers as the crew member walked on stage with it. From my point of view, I could see that clear plastic tiles were placed over the stage floor. This intrigued me most of all. Two smaller LCD screens were placed on either side of Ray Luzier’s elaborate drumkit. Korn are know for having spectacular light shows to enhance the band’s music but did this mean the band would be taking the light show to a new level?
No sooner did the house lights go out and the sheet was removed from Davis’ mic stand, the intro music began. Luzier was the first to walk across the stage. Luzier made his way to his massive drumkit and began hammering away as Brian “Head” Welch and James “Munky” Shaffer walked on stage, followed by Fieldy. The quartet finished a brief jam session, striking the final chord as Davis walked on stage.
The crowd, five thousand strong at this point, erupted into even louder screams as Davis walked center stage, raised his hands high above his head and screamed back at them in return. “Are you ready for this shit, Omaha,” Davis asked the crowd. The aural response was intense. In turn, Davis shifted, spun on his heels and cut into “Twist”. Looking behind me, I could see the crowd bouncing. Korn’s set was going to be brutal. The band wasted no time with pausing and allowing us all to catch our breath. The continued to metal assault with two of their heaviest tracks; “Right Now” and “Here To Stay”. As much fun as the crowd looked like they were having, let me tell you, there’s no better feeling for me than standing only a few feet in front of the musicians that have inspired me for two decades with no barricade between us and screaming those lyrics with them as I’m photographing.
Seeing these five men on stage, doing what they love, is truly a sight to see. For a lot of us, we never got to see Welch perform with the band during the original line-up days. Having taken a long absence from the band, fans were elated by his return. While Fieldy stayed on top of the LCD screens, pacing back and forth, Head thrashed around like a lunatic in a straight-jacket, his dreadlocks whipping back and forth. Munky was just as energetic; slowly swaying at times but generally head-banging along with the music. For the first time in many years, I wanted to be right in the middle of the moshpit that sprung to life during “Right Now” and I envied those brutes and pit-bosses that were controlling the floor. A few times, Davis looked out into the crowd, pointed at the pits and smiled a wicked grin.
The stage lights burst with sickly shades of purple and green, and bathed the bands in hues of red and natural light. The stage floor light up on several occassions, casting sinister shadows on Head and Munky as they’d lean forward and scratch their guitar strings. The LCD screens that Fieldy had perched on didn’t play videos, but trippy images and shapes that melted and bled into each other. Luzier was in his own world though. The man is a maniac on the drums. As much energy as Davis showed on stage, it was Luzier that was really getting a workout. He’d hammer away, toss his sticks in the air, hit the bass drum, catch the sticks and go back to the rythmic assualt.
Having the opportunity to photograph the first, second and third songs of Korn’s set, I made my way back to my seat after “Here to Stay” with enough time to catch the final half of “Love and Meth”. The band’s new songs carried just as much weight at their older tracks. This being the twentieth anniversary of Korn’s debut album, it takes true talen to keep the music fresh after so many years and still be able to create new music that fits so well with the older tracks when performed live.
Industrial beats and noise played during the breaks between several songs as Davis filled his lungs with oxygen from a tank placed by Luzier’s drumkit. Even touring keyboardist Zac “Horse” Baird, placed stage left of Luzier’s drums, thrashed and head banged along with the band. Baird has been a touring member of Korn since 2006, and, though rarely fully seen, especially without his horse mask, knows how to rock out in his own corner of the stage.
The LCD screen and stage weren’t the only lights though. Luzier’s drumkit lit up like an air-traffic contoller’s switch board. Having so much chrome on his drums, they sparkled and shined every time the stage lights would go off.
As the band played “Falling Away From Me”, two giant circle pits opened on the floor. From my seats it looked like a wicked hurricane of flailing bodies. The rules of the pit stood strong though; when I saw someone fall, they were picked up by their fellow pit-bosses. Davis has always told his fans that they are family, and tonight’s family had each other’s back.
The setlist that Korn had prepared for the Prepare For Hell tour was full of fan favorites. “Good God”, a track rarely played live, was one of those tracks. It was brilliant to hear a few thousand people screaming the words back that Davis threw into his mic. Even between the songs, the industrial interludes were enough to excite the crowd. The biggest response of the evening though was when the band stuck the opening of “Hater”. The moshing paused for just a moment then kicked back into high gear. As the band jammed out during the last chorus of “Hater”, Davis walked back to center stage, “You will never frucking bring me down,” he screamed into the crowd as the stage lights went black and the band exited the stage.
There was a long silent moment before Davis walked back on stage. The crowd burst into another round of screams and cheers when they saw that Davis had walked back out with his bagpipes. One of the band’s most beloved tracks, “Shoots and Ladders”, always gets the crowd’s blood pumping. As Davis spun and thrashed around while playing the bagpipes, Fieldy paced the stage, and Head made his way to the top of the stage right LCD screen and did a few childish tumble rolls. Several thousand fists pumped in unison as the crowd chanted along with Davis. Without pausing the band finished with the final verse and chorus of their cover of Metallica’s “One” before shredding into “Got the Life”.
The stage was drown in shades of blue as the strobe lights popped and flashed. “Got the Life” continued to pull raw energy from the fans, and Davis led them in a clap along, conducting the fans like an orchestra master. Another short break with more heavy industrial music followed, and the band smashed into “Freak On a Leash”. From my view, I saw the size of the moshpits continue to grow with each song Korn played, until finally half the arena floor was one massive moshpit.
Giving the fans a chance to catch their breath after “Freak On a Leash”, Davis addressed the crowd. He told us that after twenty plus years as a band, how blessed they were to have the opportunity to continue making music, and how thankful they are for the chance to continue to play to so many fans. “This will be out last song tonight,” Davis continued. “This year is the twentieth anniversary of our first album and we chose to close our set with this song because this is the song that started it all twenty years ago.” The fans began to bounce as Fieldy hit the opening riff of “Blind”.
Davis had one last question for us though. “Are you guys ready?” What a silly question. Of course we were. The circle pits opened again and continued throughout the entire song, the fans screaming back every word, as didn’t stop until after the guys had finished with their final jam session of the evening.
Once again Korn proved to their fans that, even after two decades of touring, the band still knows how to put on an amazing show.
Setlist:
Intro
Twist
Right now
Here to stay
Love and meth
Falling Away From Me
Good God
Hater
Shoots and Ladders
Got the Life
Freak on a Leash
Blind
As soon as Korn left the stage, the crew began tear down. It was no small job to remove all of Korn’s gear though, but the crowd would never see all the hard work that would go into setting up Slipknot’s stage. Moments after Korn left the stage, a circus style curtain was lowered, blocking the fans’ view. I love secrets, and nothing was more secretive in the world of metal than what Slipknot’s stage would look like.
The time it took for Slipknot’s stage to be set gave me the chance to mill about the photo pit and talk to the fans. I spoke with more than a few who would be seeing Slipknot for the first time tonight. A few, like myself, told stories about seeing the ‘knot “back in the day” at various venues in Des Moines. A few dozen that I spoke with had also made the trip from central Iowa for tonight’s show. Most of them were upset about the band not playing a show in their home city, but it’s very understandable that the band would have picked Omaha instead of Des Moines for tonight’s stop. It’s all about travel time. The tour promoters knew that the band would draw fans from Des Moines and surrounding areas if they stopped in Omaha. Playing a show in Des Moines would mean that fewer fans would attend shows planned in Wisconsin and Kansas City as it would pull from people from only a few hours drive.
As soon as the house lights were put out, XIX began to play and the stage lights burst to life as the nine masked lords of metal walked on stage. Their shadows danced against the curtain that blocked our view. Screams and cheers erupted from the crowd and peaked at a deafening level as XIX melted away and guitarists Jim Root and Mick Thompson strummed the opening chords of Sarcastrophe. The curtain slowly raised, exposing the benign chaos of the stage.
Vocalist Corey Taylor marched confidently on set and found his mark center stage. Percussionists Chris Fehn and Shawn “Clown” Crahan stood atop their drumkits motionless and stared omminously into the crowd. Master of samples, Craig Jones, also stood motionless behind his podium. DJ Sid Wilson bounced nervosly behind turn-tables. Slipknot’s new bassist stood still in front of the band’s new drummer’s drumkit. Tonight would be the first time seeing the band live for so many of the fans in the crowd. For other’s, it wouldn’t be their first Slipknot concert, but i may be the first time seeing the band live since the death of founder and bassist Paul Gray.
The band’s stage was set up like the inside of a twisted circus tent. The disembodied head of a massive goat horned devil leared into the crowd from behind the main drumkit. Ramps shot off the the left and right of the back stage platform, and an LCD screen stood tall as a twisted funhouse mirror.
It was the calm before the storm until Taylor began to sing the first verse of Sarcastrophe. The crowd responded in kind. The crutal energy of the crowd flowed onto the stage and was devoured by the band. That brutal energy was carried over in The Heretic Anthem. Wilson even joined Taylor center stage to scream the tracks chorus. The intensity was pushed further by the massive amounts of pyro used during the song, and continued into the 3rd song of the band’s set, My Plague. Taylor had teased when I spoke with him during Stone Sour’s recent stop in Omaha that Slipknot would be adding My Plague into the Prepare For Hell set, and it was spectacular to hear the song that hadn’t been played live for nearly a decade. As Root and Thompson thrashed on their sides of the stage, Clown and Fehn would pace back and forth when they weren’t slamming away on their drumkits. At one point, Taylor stood atop his platform and gazed out into the thousands of screaming fans. Even masked, anyone looking at Taylor could see the massive grin on his face.
The pyro burst again and the moshing continued during The Devil In I. The moshing grew into two massive circle pits as the band hit Psychosocial. While the band’s bassist stuck to the back of the stage, Fehn and Crahan donned their marching band drum harnesses for a portion of Psychosocial. After ditching the drum harness, Crahan pranced and twirled around behind Taylor before the song ended, the stage lights went dark and the band exited the stage.
Taylor was the first to come back on stage and address the crowd. “Were gonna take you some place dark and fucked up. Lets see what you do with this one,” he warned the crowd before Jones and Wilson kicked off The Negative One. The stage was bathed in sickly shades of green and purple. The light show heightened the callous mood of the brutal track. More circle pits opened as Taylor orchestrated the crowd. Fehn grabbed one of his handheld mics and paced back and forth across the front monitors, screaming the chorus’ of the track.
Fehn and Crahan’s drmkits raised to their full height, spinning slowly, as the lights bathed the stage in sickly shades of red, orange and yellow during Three Nil. Taking my eyes off the brutality of the stage, I looked into the crowd, seeing the circle pits forming like thnderous storm clouds. After a closer look, I could see the pit bosses were mostly male, The few ladies trying to join in on the fun were actually being held back by the guys.
As Three Nil came to an end, Taylor addressed the crowd again. “Do you want some more,” he purred into his mic. The crowd response was expected; deafening cheers. Wilson and Jones’ platforms rose and fell in tandem, kicking off Eyeless. One of the first songs that introduced the world to the 9 Masked Men from Iowa is always a crowd favorite. As Taylor stood center stage screaming into his mic, the fans screamed back every single word. Slipknot’s bassist even took the time to walk to the front of the stage, then sprinted up the backstage ramp before taking his place back in front of the drumkit.
Wilson closed out Eyeless with a brief solo that melted into Vermillion. This version of Vermillion was much heavier than the album version. Taylor paced back and forth, taunting the crowd. Fehn’s drumkit rose to it’s full height, allowing a clear view of the percussionist. Fehn was wearing his classic white mask backwards. His arms, sticks in both hands, flailed and thrust at the crowd in a twisted broken pantomine. The circle pits grew larger. The intensity of the night was about to reach a pinnacle. During Vermillion’s last verse, Taylor jumped off his perch, landing in a crouch on the stage, flopping around as he screamed “She isn’t real!” Wilson closed out the track with another scratch solo before the stage lights went dark.
Taylor was the first to return to the stage, giving a shout out to King810 and Korn before asking Mr Seven to start the next song. Before I Forget once again had the crowd bouncing. Bursts of fire highlighted the track’s chorus. At one point Wilson walked to the front of the stage, taking in the view, clearly preparing himself (and the crowd) for a stage dive, but at the last minute climbed up on Crahan’s drumkit.
After a few minutes to let the crowd breath, Taylor put his index finger to his lips, demanding silence and asked the fans to help him out with the next song. “I’ll start it off and you finish,” he told the crowd. Taylor then whispered, “I push my fingers into my….” To hear a few thousand fans scream “eyes” was a brilliant thing. Several times during Duality, the crowd’s voices actually drowned out Taylor’s. More pyrotechics emphasised the urgency of Duality’s meaning, and continued to psh the fans to the edge before the song ends and the bands walks back off the stage.
As the band walks back on stage, Taylor has a few words for the fans. “We want to thank everyone for showing up tonight. The last few years have been some of the toughest for the band. But you helped us get through this.” A few thousand voices screamed back our thanks.
“Do you wanna go back to frucking 1999,” Taylor then asked.
Before the cheers had died down, the band shredded into their “classic” hits; Wait And Bleed, and Spit It Out. Even though highlighted by full pyro, things got intense when Fehn jumped off stage and leaned into the crowd over the barricade with mic in hand, giving the fans the chance to sing with the band. Crahan was the next to exit the stage, making his way through the seething masses and making his way up section 105 of the Century Link Center. He stopped a few times to shake hands and even allowed a few fans to take a quick photo.
“Are you ready to get weird,” Taylor asked the crowd. Because shit hadn’t already gotten weird enough? Fehn made his way across the stage to Thompson. As Thompson strummed his guitar, Fehn played the chords.
It came to that point of the show that makes a Slipknot concert a religious experience. Everyone knows what to do. Before Taylor could even ask or tell the fans what to do, they all started kneeling on the arena’s floor.
“Don’t get up until I say JUMP THE FUCK UP,” Taylor reminded them. It was a beautiful sight to see the floor burst to life on Taylor’s command as more flames burst from the stage. Before the crowd gets a chance to settle down, Taylor asks “Do you want one more” and the band rips into Custer. Taylor, still perched center stage, orchestrates the crowd into another frenzy. Fehn and Crahan grab their mics and join in on a few of the choruses. Another moment of history plays out as thousands of voices raise in unity to scream “CUT CUT ME UP AND FUCK FUCK ME UP!”
As the music ends, the 9 Masked Men quietly exit the stage. The crowd looked almost shocked at the sudden departure of the band. But Slipknot weren’t done with us yet.
After a few minutes, Wilson and Jones were the first to walk back on stage. 742617000027 heralded the return of Slipknot to the stage before Root and Thompson played the opening chords of (sic). Crahan beat his beer keg with an aluminum baseball bat before joining Fehn and Taylor center stage, mic in hand, each screaming “SICK!” Crahan jumed off Taylor’s perch and did a river dance, prancing around the stage. Fehn made his way to the back of the stage to stand facing the fun house mirror and swayed slowly side to side.
Not wasting any time, the guys tore into People=Shit. The circle pits got even bigger as the crowd screamed “People Equal Shit” and drown out Taylor’s voice again. Intense red and white strobe lights burst throughout the song.
Taylor then thanked the crowd for “kicking ass and taking names” and promised we would see them again.
“Now it’s time for your national fucking anthem.”
Since 1999, Surfacing has been a fan favorite during the live shows. I remember hearing Taylor tell the story about writing the anthem while we worked at the porn store. “Dude! Can you imagine hearing people shouting this song back?” Yes, Mr Taylor, I can. It still brings a smile to the man’s face to look into the crowd and see the fan’s screaming back every single fucking word, middle fingers raised in unity as flames burst all around the stage.
Graciously bowing, the band waved to the fans as Taylor once again thanked the crowd for their support.
As the Lords of Metal exited the stage, -funny-, a bonus track off of .5: The Gray Chapter played then melted into Til We Die.
Was Omaha prepared for Hell? That’s a stupid fucking question.
Setlist:
XIX
Sarcastrophe
Heretic Anthem
My Plague
Devil in I
Psychosocial
The Negative One
Three Nil
Eyeless
Vermillion
Before I Forget
Duality
Wait and Bleed
Spit it out
Custer
Encore;
742617000027
SIC
people=shit
Surfacing
-funny-
Til We Die
