Seattle Subsonic

Stone Temple Pilots @ Bumbershoot

September 3rd, 2008

A big draw to me – and I’m sure lots of other fans – for Bumbershoot is the efficiency. Shows start when they’re supposed to, artists play their allotted time, and the crew gets the next band set up like clock-work. For <b>Stone Temple Pilots</b> to show up a half-hour later than their scheduled start time was incredibly shitty. I’m sure they’ll have their reason for it, but I really don’t want to hear it. When you play a festival like Bumbershoot, you show up on time. The fans have been on their feet all day, and to make them wait an hour between sets shows a complete lack of respect. If you can’t make that happen, don’t sign up for it. I talked to a couple of friends after the show and they heard rumors about Scott Weiland and why the band was late, and anybody who’s followed the history of STP can probably figure out what these rumors are. Who even knows if they are true, but the band is doing this to themselves by showing up as late as they did. The Seattle music scene has been through enough front men bent on giving into their cynicism rather than nurturing their creativity and to see even a hint of that tired old cliché and rock-star boorishness does not bring back pleasant memories and is really not welcome. My message to STP is this: Grow the fuck up! When a band as successful as yours gets back together after 6 years your fans expect to see some maturation, not a repeat of what caused you to break up in the first place! I absolutely mean this, and I want you to succeed this second-time around, because your performance fucking kicked ass! Do not destroy yourself with this pettiness!.
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The band was tight, and embraced the rock ‘n roll hits of their past with a fervor not seen with bands who do not have a bright vision of their own future. They started out slow with the anthemic ‘Big Empty’, and Scott Weiland truly demonstrated his talent with his vocal range during the chorus. After that the band kicked into high gear with one of my personal favorites, ‘Wicked Garden’, and the way the crowd responded to that song you could easily forget that they even broke up. The band segued into ‘Big Bang Baby’ before ripping the stage with another favorite of mine, ‘Vaseline’. There is no doubt that these guys are pros, and what the fans want, they deliver. I was kind of hoping to hear some new stuff, but then again why would I go to see STP if I didn’t want to hear the hits? It was pretty much a greatest hits show, which the crowd certainly didn’t have a problem with. I’m not sure if Weiland was good at making fun of himself, or just plain clueless when introducing ‘Plush’. ‘This song was on our first album and you might have heard it before.’ Yeah, about every fucking half hour for the entire summer of ’93!
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STP, you rocked the shit out of Bumbershoot, and you should be proud of that. Now get it the fuck together and don’t disrespect your fans, show up to the shows on time!