Birmingham 7th December 2008, All Hope is Gone! (Slipknot - Live)

Member Name: Tsportmat

Product:	Slipknot - Live
Date:	13/05/09 (46 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Great spectacle, great crowd.

Disadvantages: Sid was slightly injured and careful.

Where was it?

Birmingham NIA. This is a great venue, very large 'mosh pit' area, bit stage. No sloping floor which can be nice for short people. Also the floor is very slippery, so you will probably fall over, but people will pick you up so don't let it put you off :D.

When?

7th December 2008. This was part of the UK leg of their 'All Hope is Gone' world tour. That is their newest album, a very good album in my opinion, more like Volume 3 than the earlier stuff.

What did I think?

I have seen many bands live, and these would definitely rank up near the top. Not because they're my favourite band on CD, they certainly know how to put on a show however. Metallica and Dream Theater are my favourite on CD, and I've seen both of these live. Metallica were fantastic as I saw them at Download festival 2006, and it was a great crowd. Dream Theater were very good at Wolverhampton Civic Hall if you want to just listen to them play, and people generally stand still which is good two.

Slipknot (at Birmingham NIA) was a truly great show however because of a number of reasons. They played very well (some people think they aren't very talented, but I would disagree), and they played a very good selection of old and new music. Right from the outset it was just a great spectacle however as soon as Slipknot hit the stage. Before them Children of Bodom opened the set; Bodom are one of my top bands of all time, but the crowd weren't really up for them, so they were good but nothing special on the day (much better at Download '08). Machine Head followed; they were more the crowd's cup of tea, so there was plenty of jumping about. I'll have to admit I did fall over once during this due to the slippery floor at the NIA and lots of drinks which had been thrown went over the floor. Or at least the ones which didn't cover us went onto the floor...

Then the bit we had been waiting for, Mick walked out onto an elaborately set up stage, and looked intimidating. The rest followed in time, and started cracking on. There weren't too many gaps between songs either, which was a nice change and they all seemed up for it to an extent, but not quite to the level which I had seen on the Diastaterpiece DVD a few years ago on the 'Iowa' tour. Sid made no expeditions into the crowd either (maybe because he broke his ankle or something by jumping from a high platform into the crowd a while back).

The whole way through the crowd was great, we were just far enough back so we were't like sardines, but were in the thick of the mosh pits, which was fantastic, some great circle pits, jumping around and a bit of a wall of death during Machine Head which was all good. The highlight for me was during 'Spit it Out' where the band stops (bar the sinister strumming of Mick) until everyone is on the floor, then when Corey shouts 'jump the f*** up', everyone does what they're told (look up 'Spit it Out Live' on youtube if you want an idea of a slipknot concert).

A slight complaint is that they didn't play some of my favourite songs like 'Left Behind', 'My Plague' and 'Wait and Bleed'. But hopefully they'll play some at Download '09, which I cannot wait for :D.

A word of warning is that if you go down the front it will be a bit violent, so if you don't like being thrown about don't go there. Having said that it's not vicious and no one will deliberately hurt you, and if you fall down they'll pick you straight back up again. At least give it a go if you're going to go to a Slipknot concert (which everyone should do at some point in my opinion) or you'll be missing out, I think you'll enjoy it (unless you like 5'2", in which case you may struggle to see).

What did they play?

Intro - IOWA
Surfacing
The Blister Exists
Get This
Before I Forget
Liberate
Disasterpiece
Dead Memories
Psychosocial
The Heretic Anthem
Prosthetics
Spit It Out
Duality
Only One

Encore

People=S@#t
(Sic)
OUTRO - 'Till We Die (over speakers)

Summary: Great show, everyone should see the 'knot before they die!