placebo in concert : on tuesday,march 16th i had the priviledge of going to newport music hall in columbus,ohio to see the flick/placebo/stabbing westward show.
my friend sarah and i arrived around 7:30 and were lucky enough to find a good spot right up front!! we didn't dare move. the venue began to fill as the shows went on. flick began about 8:02 (we were so close we could read the digital clock backstage!!). flick was really good,very mellow.
got mixed reviews from the crowd. they have good pop-rocky kinda-alterna-rock sounding songs,including a song on "the faculty soundtrack" and "the i know what you did last summer soundtrack". they had a fairly short set (they only have 1 album--the set lasted around 30 mins). It took placebo about 25-35 minutes to set up. we were on the left side up against the bar screaming and yelling as the lights dimmed and spacey ambient music played.
it seemed like forever waiting for placebo!! the guy next to us hadn't heard of placebo and asked us who we would compare them too. we said they were too unique for comparisons. after the show, he told us they sounded like "the lead singer of orgy on helium." he really liked them too. as for placebo, they eventually came out--and everyone went nuts! stefan towered over brian and we couldn't see steve because they moved his drumset back further due to it being bigger then the drummer from flick's. brian wore a kind of dark-jean-type material long-sleeved shirt with rolled up white and blue plaid cuffs. the front of the shirt was zippered and kind of resembled the one that the lead singer of flick had on.
brian also wore black leather pants. he has no lipstick on,but did have on blue eyeshadow and black nailpolish--THAT'S HOW CLOSE WE WERE! stefan wore a skin-tight white shirt with glitter on it. it was so tight we could see his navel! i'm thinking he also had on leather pants. as for steve's attire,we couldn't tell. placebo began their set by brian announcing "hi,we're placebo. this is our 666th show and satan's on the guest list." he said something else but we couldn't make it out considering we
were about 4 feet from the speakers! then,they went straight into "scared of girls"--a song that sarah was praying before that they play! one of their hardest songs too--which ignited the crowd into a moshing, jumping, crowdsurfing frenzy!! within the course of placebo's set we noticed several things because we were so close. we made out stefan mouth "fuck you" to brian during his guitar solo...prompting brian to show a sliver of a smile! also, during one of the songs (can't remember exactly which one)--stefan stuck his guitar between brian's legs and spanked the back of it as he kissed his neck. the crowd loved it--shocking to sarah and i considering all the bad press about placebo and homophobic american crowds. during "bruise pristine",
brian's right ear plug fell out and upon attempting to get it back in, he motioned offstage for the crew members and 2 of them came out and fixed it while brian sung and played. when,even they couldn't get it--brian stopped to fix it,leaving a vocal part out in "bruise pristine" and filling the gap with instrumental. it was an absolutely WONDERFUL show. at the end, stefan threw several guitar picks into the mosh pit. after placebo's set we made sure to write down all the songs they played--we just kind of forgot the order. placebo seemed to save their singles till the end--making the crowd scream between songs--"play every you,every me!!" or "pure morning!!!". but everyone liked their
non-single tracks too. i listed the songs they played below...including how brian announced each one.Songs marked by an asterisk are in the right order.
brick shithouse *
"this is called the brick SHIThouse."
you don't care about us *
bionic *
"this is a song about a robot fuck."
bruise pristine
"this song is to show that some bruises never heal."
allergic (to thoughts of mother earth)
nancy boy *
"this song is for a good friend of mine who recently discovered she
was gay."
after placebo's set, stabbing westward took FOREVER to set up, so we only got to see 3 of their songs. they were good too, really aggressive. on our way out, sarah asked one of the bouncers
if they get to converse with the acts. one bouncer told us that he drove around brian earlier in the day for 3 hours and that they stopped at cvs pharmacy to get some candy. he told us how we could get autographs but the turn where the tour buses were was too hard to get into. nonetheless, the show absolutely rocked.
placebo on much : placebo was on a 15-minute snippet on march 17th,1999 (9:30 eastern time) on muchmusic. brian discussed the album and clips from past vids were shown. in addition,the video for "pure morning" was played.