burned all my notebooks...what good are notebooks: Covenant Of Noise: Soundgarden At The Wiltern

SOUNDGARDEN

WILTERN THEATER, LA

16 FEBRUARY, 2013

In the middle night of a sold-out three night run at the Wiltern Theater in LA's Koreatown district, Seattle's 90's guitar colossus Soundgarden pulled one out of their hat and gave back to the faithful for a solid set running two hours and change. Kicking things off with "Nothing To Say" from the Screaming Life EP was a clear signal, and it wasn't until the sixth song in that they moved beyond 1991, and there didn't seem to be a complaint to be heard. Lead singer Chris Cornell was in fine form, both vocally and verbally, as evidenced by his intro to "Outshined", noting that, (paraphrased), 'most of the shows they played in LA were full of industry people, and now that the industy was dead, it was good to see the fans again.' Not necessarily the nicest way to thank people who worked hard to make one's career, but if you've ever been in the middle of a blase industry crowd chattering in the good seats and otherwise sucking all the oxygen out of the room, you could see where he was going with his point.
Once they broke the ice with "By Crooked Steps" from last year's King Animal, their first salvo since 1996, they were more than generous with new songs, seeding in just over half of the new LP into a set that contained only two songs apiece from what was considered their commercial heyday, Superunknown and Down On The Upside. The rest of the set was weighted heavily to Louder Than Love, Ultramega OK, and of course, the mighty Badmotorfinger, from which was pulled nearly as many songs as the new LP.
A nice surprise towards the end of the set found the band bringing out drummer Matt Cameron's son to take over guitar on the Cameron penned "Eyelids Mouth", after Cornell offered a modest assessment of his own guitar skills. Cameron the younger held his own, and the band reached back for "Loud Love", before finishing off the main set with the new "Rowing".
The crowd turned into a thrashing mess by the end, an encore that offered up "Searching With My Good Eye Closed", and a ferocious "Rusty Cage", before ending with Ultramega OK's "Beyond The Wheel", culminating in drummer Matt Cameron and Chris Cornell exiting the stage, leaving bassist Ben Sheperd and guitarist Kim Thayil to create a mini-My Bloody Valentine feedback coda to end the evening on the sweetest of noisy notes.
For a look at some super photos courtesy of Mike Rosati/The Owl Mag from the mid-week show at the Fox Theater, Oakland: click here

SETLIST:

NOTHING TO SAY (B)

FLOWER (A)

OUTSHINED (D)

GUN (C)

JESUS CHRIST POSE (D)

BY CROOKED STEPS (G)

ROOM A THOUSAND YEARS WIDE (D)

ATTRITION (G)

THE DAY I TRIED TO LIVE (E)

BEEN AWAY TOO LONG (G)

WORSE DREAMS (G)