Sunday 8th July 2012 HMV Apollo
So the summer season of shows roll on in London. Hot on the heels of Megadeth and Kiss, it was time for Faith No More to return to the UK and play a couple of shows after the cancellation of the Sonisphere festival.
23 years ago, The Real Thing was unleashed upon us. It was groundbreaking, much in the same way as Appetite for Destruction changed everything coming out of L.A. at the time. It was a gamechanger for metal, and a landmark album for so many bands to follow, with every track an absolute winner. Well Faith no More are back, and as Dead or Alive would say, they're still mad, bad, and dangerous to know . . . .
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| HMV Apollo . . . . . or Hammersmith Odeon? |
Non-conformist is probably the best way to describe these guys. The stage was like the set from One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, in that everything was clinically white. Marshalls wrapped in bed sheets, mic stands white taped, keyboards whited out, even the roadies were white from head to toe and you felt you were entering the asylum. To add to the surrealism, baskets of flowers were placed everywhere around the stage, not just a couple either, dozens of them (Interflora must be loving FNM). One chap skipped the last night at Denmark's Roskilde festival to fly over for this; Faith no More fans are indeed a special breed.
Lights dimmed and on they came, whipping through Woodpeckers from Mars with the mandatory clip of Tom Jones' Delilah mid song. No time for breath and Patton & co went straight into Midlife Crisis and Ricochet. Hammersmith rejoiced. The band were like everything else all in white, and very very loud, keyboards & guitar piercing the air as a kaleidoscope of colours bathed the white drapes around the stage throughout the evening.
Faith no More are a band close to the edge; why do anything simply and straightforward when you can challenge your audience. They felt no need to play classics like The Real Thing and From Out of Nowhere when they could deliver Greed (1st time since 1990), and Pills for Breakfast.
Epic was literally just that, an absolute stormer and then a few minutes later Rick Astley lyrics were upon us and Patton teased the crowed one minute with smiles, the next with ballistic rage and screams. Roddy Bottum thanked Hammersmith "How many times have we played here?" and they finished the set with Just a Man. Four encores followed including a demented, angry version of We Care a Lot and, after 90 minutes of madness, on came the lights. For five minutes, everyone waited half expecting a couple more; a roadie tuned the bass and the stage was left in tact, Hammersmith cheered, but that was it. No more Faith No More.
The band seem to be loving their renaissance as much as the fans enjoy getting another taste of days gone by. Tight, cohesive, surreal, aggressive, and slightly mad . . . . that's Faith no More all over. Hammersmith loved it; who needs Sonisphere when Faith No More can go back to the theatres?
Lights dimmed and on they came, whipping through Woodpeckers from Mars with the mandatory clip of Tom Jones' Delilah mid song. No time for breath and Patton & co went straight into Midlife Crisis and Ricochet. Hammersmith rejoiced. The band were like everything else all in white, and very very loud, keyboards & guitar piercing the air as a kaleidoscope of colours bathed the white drapes around the stage throughout the evening.
Faith no More are a band close to the edge; why do anything simply and straightforward when you can challenge your audience. They felt no need to play classics like The Real Thing and From Out of Nowhere when they could deliver Greed (1st time since 1990), and Pills for Breakfast.
Epic was literally just that, an absolute stormer and then a few minutes later Rick Astley lyrics were upon us and Patton teased the crowed one minute with smiles, the next with ballistic rage and screams. Roddy Bottum thanked Hammersmith "How many times have we played here?" and they finished the set with Just a Man. Four encores followed including a demented, angry version of We Care a Lot and, after 90 minutes of madness, on came the lights. For five minutes, everyone waited half expecting a couple more; a roadie tuned the bass and the stage was left in tact, Hammersmith cheered, but that was it. No more Faith No More.
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| The unique signed gig poster on sale that sold out at £50 a pop |
Setlist
Woodpeckers from Mars / Delilah
Midlife Crisis
Ricochet
Land of Sunshine
Evidence
Everything's Ruined
Spirit
Last Cup of Sorrow
Digging the Grave
Easy
Epic
Gentle Art of Making Enemies
King for a Day
Ashes to Ashes
Just a Man / Never Gonna Give you up
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Pills for Breakfast
Greed
We Care a Lot
Why do You Bother
CLICK HERE for a review of the Megadeth Club show at Camden's Electric Ballroom on 12th June 2012
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