Sometimes, people forget.
It’s easy to forget about A Perfect Circle. The band tends to disappear into the shadows from time to time, going into forced hibernation whenever Maynard Keenan returns to one of his many other passions — side project Puscifer, his vineyard in Arizona, or his “day job” with progressive metal icons TOOL.
Not only that, but APC’s lineup seems to be a revolving door — an ever-changing cast of characters, and practically a who’s who of session musicians. The band’s seen ex-Primus drummer Tim Alexander, Zwan bassist Paz Lenchantin, Queens of the Stone Age guitarist Troy Van Leeuwen, and Nine Inch Nails jack-of-all-trades Danny Lohner all come and go. The only two constants are the band’s integral cornerstones: vocalist Keenan and composer Billy Howerdel.
Which makes it easy to forget APC created the seminal alt-rock record of the 2000s. More than a decade later, Mer de Noms still holds up as a masterpiece, partly because of its classical and ornate beauty, and partly because there’s still nothing else on earth that sounds anything like it.
But a funny thing happens when people forget — something usually comes along to remind them.
A Perfect Circle - 07.28.11 - Gibson Amphitheatre
Tonight’s “reminder” featured ex-Smashing Pumpkins guitarist James Iha, Ashes Divide drummer Jeff Friedl, and Puscifer bassist Matt McJunkins complementing Howerdel and Keenan. The material was an equal smattering of songs from Mer de Noms and Thirteenth Step, with a healthy dose of the band’s 2004 cover album eMotive.
With the United States a week away from defaulting, with unemployment at a disastrous high, and with the nation’s populace divided over petty political differences, here was A Perfect Circle, calling for people to change their fists to handshakes, covering John Lennon tunes, and singing about peace, love and understanding. The message might have came off as overly preachy or heavy-handed if it weren’t so perfectly timed, so well-executed, or so utterly goddamned necessary. Or even if it hadn’t been delivered in APC’s trademarked form of dark, ominous thunder.
But there they were, reminding us all we’re capable of so much more than petulance, catastrophe, and murdering each other. It’s a message we shouldn’t have to hear — words we shouldn’t have to be told — but it’s necessary every now and again anyway, especially at a time like this, in a nation like this, and in a city like Los Angeles. It’s a message we’ll undoubtedly need to hear again soon, which is exactly what made Billy Howerdel’s closing salvo so welcome and refreshing:
“Thanks for the warm welcome, Los Angeles. We’ll see you again… in a couple of months.”
Show Highs:
- Maynard James Keenan can still fucking sing
- Watching opening Japanese all-girl punk band work crowd in broken English
- Performances of “The Outsider” and “Counting Bodies Like Sheep…”
- MJK using solo Crucifix/Joni Mitchell covers to bookend show
- Rendition of Depeche Mode’s “People Are People”
- So good overall, G.A. actually contemplated giving eMotive another chance. Until…
Show Lows:
- Band played “When the Levee Breaks” by Led Zeppelin. Whatever the hell it is they think they’re doing, we wish they would stop. Just… stop. Let’s all forget this ever happened, or at least relegate it to the ugly little footnote in an otherwise long, glorious, and ongoing history of A Perfect Circle. You know, like Barry Bonds is to Major League Baseball?
- Thrash reinterpretation of “3 Libras” doesn’t compare favorably to haunting beauty of original version
Set List:
- Annihilation (Crucifix)
- Imagine (John Lennon)
- Weak and Powerless
- The Hollow
- Blue
- People Are People (Depeche Mode)
- The Outsider
- Rose
- (What’s So Funny ’bout) Peace, Love and Understanding? (Brinsley Schwarz)
- When the Levee Breaks (Led Zeppelin)
- The Noose
- 3 Libras (All Main Courses)
- The Package
- Gimmie Gimmie Gimmie (Black Flag)
- Orestes
- Passive
- Counting Bodies Like Sheep to the Rhythm of the War Drums
- Fiddle and the Drum (Joni Mitchell)
- By and Down
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