I don't like Nickelback, but I am not ashamed to say that they have a great live production. I don't listen to them either, but I did recognize a few songs that I have heard on the radio. Stage and show production goes a long way with me, and Nickelback had it all: lights, pyrotechnics, two catwalks with moving walkways (like at the airport), and a flying saucer. Yeah that's right, midway through the set, it descended from the ceiling from over the soundboard, Nickelback got on, it ascended back to the ceiling, and spun slowly while the band played 3 songs. Thanks to a couple of good friends, I also had one of the best seats in the house, located in a special section on the floor at what would normally be extreme stage left of a typical rectangular stage.

If Mötley Crüe and KISS didn't have an overwhelming amount of production, pyrotechnics, a drum rollercoaster (Mötley Crüe), and a fire-breathing, blood drooling, bat-like Demon (KISS), these bands might not be worth seeing.

Vince Neil sings every other word of every Mötley Crüe song -- seriously dude, get a teleprompter if you can't remember that "at the" comes between "Shout" and "Devil". Tommy Lee can't seem to leave his DJ persona at home and just be a heavy metal drummer -- stop calling us "bitches" and save that for your hip-hop and dubstep fans who would probably appreciate it more.

Meanwhile, KISS' set is so predictable that I could close my eyes for the whole show and know when (spoiler alert!) Gene Simmons is going to breathe fire and is going to fly up to the top of the stage, Paul Stanley is going to fly over the crowd, smoke is going to come out of Tommy Thayer's guitar, and Eric Singer's drum riser is going to elevate halfway up to the top of the stage.

Aside from all that, it was still a great show to watch... I used the predictability factor to my advantage and had my camera ready for all of the over-the-top photo-op moments!

Slipknot, Slayer, Motörhead and Anthrax was all Rockstar Energy Drink needed for their annual summer tour. Whitechapel and As I Lay Dying were a bonus, but The Devil Wears Prada, I The Breather, Betraying the Martyrs, and Upon a Burning Body could have stayed home, with the show starting a few hours later, and it still would have been great!

Unfortunately, not much had changed for Slipknot since July 2008, the last time I saw them (also at Rockstar Mayhem Fest). Other than different jumpsuits, a few different masks, and a missing guitarist (burst appendix) and bassist (drug overdose), everything in their show was exactly the same, down to the Tommy Lee -inspired elevated spinning drum riser solo in the encore. (Tommy has since moved on to rollercoasters, see #14 above). They still had plenty of energy, it was good to hear those songs again after such a long time, and they are fun to watch. Combined with the 1-2-3 punch of Anthrax, Motörhead and Slayer, my eardrums were bleeding a little by the end of the night!

This was one of a few tech-convention concerts that occur annually around this time. Salesforce.com spent a ton of money to close Civic Center Plaza for a week, build two huge video projection towers, at least four huge LED video walls, a huge stage on Polk St., as well as pay RHCP to spend 90 minutes to perform. I was not a conference attendee, but managed to find a way in anyway!

Although there was nothing special about Red Hot Chili Peppers' performance (other than their injured guitar player constantly getting off his chair and hobbling around on his broken foot while not missing a beat), because of the those two towers, the entire front of City Hall was used as the stage backdrop and lit up by the video projection, and it was quite amazing!

This was another of a few tech-convention concerts that occur annually around this time. Not only did Oracle Corporation have their yearly party on Treasure Island (Pearl Jam, Kings of Leon, X), they hosted a multitude of smaller shows based around the entire week of their convention. For me, this show was a suitable replacement for missing The Hives in September at the Fox Theater in Oakland, although I did still miss 2/3 of this show because I was working.

They closed out the convention on an outdoor stage near the convention center, but by this time, most of the conference attendees were gone. Those who stayed got what is expected from The Hives: to be belittled and made fun of in-between songs, while at the same time, the singer proclaiming that he is basically the best thing since sliced bread (humorously calling himself "The Oracle").

I witnessed 16 Electronic Dance Music (EDM) shows this year -- Excision, Feed Me With Teeth, Nero, Zeds Dead (2x), Rusko, AVICII, Kaskade, Squarepusher, Skrillex, Axwell, Shpongle, Big Gigantic, Wolfgang Gartner, Justice, and Steve Aoki. Since I am not a fan of EDM, it's impossible to choose one show as better than the next based on the music. EDM shows are about more than the music, though; it's all about the production -- the video projection, the DJ platforms, the lights, the LCD screens, and how it is all carefully choreographed to the music.

All of the DJ's sound nearly identical to me, but I did learn a thing or two about their slightly different fanbases: Steve Aoki attracts the bro's, Shpongle is a rave for hippies, either Wolfgang Gartner or Justice (I can't remember which) had a very large Asian crowd, and all of them have legions of underage, and underdressed, fans.

Some of the DJ's (Excision, Skrillex, Feed Me With Teeth) had more production than others (Justice, Zed's Dead, Rusko, Kaskade, Steve Aoki), but the most over-the-top, extraordinary EDM show this year is definitely AVICII. His DJ platform was 12 feet high, in the 'brains' of this giant 'head' that sits in the middle of the stage. At one point, the 'brain' was lifted up 10 more feet and rode 30 feet out on tracks, above the massive swarm of people at this sold-out show. It was so amazing, I thought their ecstasy-laced heads were going to explode!

None of the other 15 EDM shows that I saw even came close to this, although Skrillex did have a X-wing fighter spaceship DJ platform attached to a hydraulic lift that also put him about 10 feet above the stage...

I admit, I listened to some hair metal in the late '80s; not Warrant, Faster Pussycat, and Poison, but more like Mötley Crüe, Skid Row, Cinderella, and Guns N' Roses. I still do occasionally.

Steel Panther is today's version of the '80s era hair metal that I didn't listen to, except they imitate and poke fun at those bands: they wear wigs, they wear spandex, and the bass player uses a handheld mirror to primp his hair and makeup in-between every song. With song titles like "Stripper Girl", "Supersonic Sex Machine", "It Won't Suck Itself", "Gold-Digging Whore", and "Let Me Cum In", they bring back the Warrant's and Poison's of the '80s in true fashion.

I've been wanting to see Steel Panther for a few years, back to when they called themselves Metal Skool and played all the time on Sunset Strip in Hollywood. Since I don't live there, of course I never saw them, until they finally booked a show up here... and believe it or not, '80s hair metal is still alive and kicking because this show was sold-out!

The very funny Louis C.K. performed four times over these two nights, and luckily for most of those audiences, Louis C.K. picked up the entire food and drink tab of all three shows on the first night! These shows cost a mere $20 to see Louis work on material that he would use on his October 2012 - February 2013 tour. Picking up the bar tab was a surprise to the audience, and by the third show, it was still mostly a surprise. At the end of each of the first two shows, when Louis would tell everyone, we were sworn to secrecy so that the next show would not find out and order everything on the menu.

The next night he did one more show, but he didn't pick up the bar tab. To see a seasoned comedian like Louis C.K. in the tiny Punch Line Comedy Club, and to see him working off-the-cuff and right out of his comedy notebook, was awesome.

I know nothing about Elvis Costello. I am not a fan. I actually got cut from my shift at this show so the possibility to leave early was there. The desire to leave early was not though. The show was that good.

If it was just Elvis & his Imposters going song-by-song through a setlist, I would have left. There was a lot more to this show than that. There was a giant wheel on-stage that was used to create the setlist. All night long, audience members were pulled on-stage to spin the wheel, sit at a bar, dance with Elvis, dance in a 'stripper' cage, and be part of the show. Elvis himself walked into the audience a few times, and even walked up to the balcony to bring down his next contestant. All of this made for a genuinely more interesting show, even if I can't tell you the name of any of his songs.

How can you NOT enjoy a GWAR show?! They dress up like creatures from Antarctica (because if you haven't heard, that's where they are from), they cut open, defile, and disfigure C-list celebrities, as well as other Inter-galactic creatures, all while spraying down their yearning audience with a colorful array of fake blood and other similar liquids!

"Why are there seats on the floor? This is a rock-n-roll show!" -- asked by one customer as I walked him to his seat. Almost everyone stood in front of their seats anyway...

Alice Cooper is the original shock rocker. Guys like Marilyn Manson and Rob Zombie would not exist if it wasn't for Alice. Unfortunately, I've only seen a total of three Alice Cooper shows, the other two being a private bare bones show in January 2009 at NAMM, and a short 45-minute set opening for Heaven & Hell in September 2007 (I missed his last headlining tour at The Warfield in October 2009)...

https://SpinningPlatters.com/show-review-refused-hives-warfield/

Members of local bands Metallica, Faith No More, AFI, and Death Angel were spotted. Nick Hipa of As I Lay Dying flew in from San Diego. Sonny Mayo of Snot, Amen, and Sevendust flew in from Los Angeles. Steve Aoki was there. Rise Against, who performed the night before in San Jose, stayed in San Francisco an extra day, even as their tour was headed to Kent, WA. Even the merch guy of August Burns Red flew in from Nashville. Just to bare witness to the long-awaited reunion of influential hardcore band Refused... and to make this show even better, The Hives opened!

https://SpinningPlatters.com/show-review-roger-waters-the-wall/

I worked most of this week building The Wall, everything from placing 700 9'x7' steel decks placed on the outfield grass, to the stage and The Wall framework, to the video walls and the audio towers... and then tearing it all down!

Every one of you should already know how ambitious and monumental and grandiose and incredible The Wall is, but to witness the entire thing come together, and be a part of it too was equally as amazing! Despite the long days, and a few overnights, I wouldn't trade this experience for anything.

I bought a ticket for this in November 2011, the first possible day I could. At the time, this band was riding high on a surge of underground popularity, as well as great reviews of both their album and their live performances. Now they were finally coming to America for their first US tour, and what better place to see Ghost than the small and intimate Bottom of the Hill!

I had only discovered Ghost a few months prior, midway through 2011, the same old-school way I discovered Iron Maiden in 1985 (see #1 below), through word of mouth and from seeing their album artwork. It probably also helped that I saw a photo of Metallica's James Hetfield wearing a Ghost t-shirt... and so upon my first listen, where I was expecting to hear the next best thing in metal music, what I actually heard was a refreshing hard rock sound, kind of a satanic Blue Oyster Cult.

The show was amazing. Ghost hit the stage and the crowd went insane; not crazy moshpit insane, there was only a little bit of pushing and shoving, but instead with way more intensity and genuine interest in the band and the songs, rather than running around in a circle bumping into people. The band consists of Papa Emeritus II and five Nameless Ghouls. Papa Emiritus wears a skull mask, a mitre, and is dressed as a Catholic bishop (with inverted crosses of course). The Nameless Ghouls all wear dark hooded robes. Since they have only one album, Ghost played a short 45-minute set of all the songs as well as their fascinating cover of The Beatles "Here Comes the Sun."

There are two things that make Iron Maiden my #1 show of the year. The first is obvious: they're IRON MAIDEN! This band was one of the first, if not the first, heavy metal bands I ever listened to. Discovered in 7th grade (1985-86) when a friend let me borrow his cassette tape, I took it home and (illegally?) made a copy of it. The artwork was unreal, which is probably why I thought it was cool to begin with.

Middle school ended up being all about Iron Maiden. A kid in my 8th grade art class was so good at drawing heavy metal images, I helped him do a life-size drawing of the Somewhere In Time album cover, and then midway through 8th grade, on January 8, 1987, I somehow convinced my dad to drive us 25 miles to shed Capital Centre to see what would be my very first concert! It would be years before I mastered the art of sneaking down to the good seats, so we watched from our actual seats on the 2nd level way up on stage left.

25 years later, Iron Maiden finally books a show at a venue that I work at. I actually didn't work much this summer at Shoreline, and because of that, I never expected to get a call for this one... then, 2 days before the show, I received a call to work the load-in and -out! This is the second thing that makes Iron Maiden my Top show.

I was assigned to lights, which was great because I was on-stage the whole time. I got to witness the entire thing come together, and be a part of it too. After all the stage lighting was raised and the backline platform built, they still had 4 moving lights that needed to be placed on this platform, which stretches from stage left to right and behind the drum kit. Half of the local lighting crew climbed a rickety staircase behind stage right to place the lights, while the rest of the crew was on the stage to lift them up. Luckily for me, I was one of the four on the platform!

We started at stage right, and at the same time we crossed the center of the platform to get the stage left lights, Iron Maiden's people were testing the hydraulic lift of their mechanical mascot Eddie and as it was lifted up to the point where it could be seen from behind the backline, I quickly snapped a photo...

With all of the side-to-side running and jumping that Brice Dickinson does on this 3-ft wide platform, all I could wonder about during my 5-minute adventure up there was 'How does he do it night after night without killing himself?' Had I attempted to run from one side to the other and make a quick exit running down that rickety staircase, I most certainly would have fallen off somewhere along the way!

Of course, the show itself was an amazing amount of classic Iron Maiden songs, energy, pyrotechnics, lights, and their mascot Eddie!