Gig Review: Stone Temple Pilots, Verizon Wireless Arena, 7/15/09
Call them what you will, but Stone Temple Pilots are back and playing it safe. Scott, Dean, Eric and Robert hit Manchester last week and made everyone feel like it was 1999. Leaning heavily on Core and Purple with a few from Tiny Music and No. 4, the Pilots rocked Manchester.
I missed the opportunity to see these guys in 2002 when they hit Durham, so I took complete advantage of seeing one of my favorite groups from last decade perform. You have to hand it to these guys for coming back and reforming almost a decade after they split, people still want to hear them play. Though they never caught much critical acclaim during their heyday, the fans knew that these boys rocked and didn’t have to prove it on record.
Playing crowd favorites: “Wicked Garden”, “Lounge Fly”, “Unglued”, “Interstate Love Song”, “Vasoline”, “Crackerman”, “Plush”, “Sour Girl”, “Sex Type Thing” and “Big Empty” had plenty of crowd participation. Even tunes like “Sin”, “Seven Caged Tigers” and “Silver Gun Superman” were surprises of the night. Early in the show a fan passed a shirt on stage for the band to sign, which they did, and return. Scott suggested the fan pass the shirt up in the first place.
After a short encore break, they returned for “Dead and Bloated”, the best reaction of the night and closed off with “Trippin’ on a Hole in a Paper Heart”. Dean DeLeo was stellar on guitar while his brother Robert kept match on bass, and Eric Kretz pounded away on the drums. Scott Weiland’s dancing was a little more subdued than it used to be, but he didn’t miss a word or beat as the night rolled on. I hope this isn’t the last we’ll see of these guys.
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[...] drinking aside, when Scott Weiland is on, he is on fire. When I had seen Stone Temple Pilots in Manchester a few summers ago, Weiland was subdued and went through the tracks with ease. Last Tuesday he [...]