We arrived at the venue to see a long line stretching down Dearborn onto the bridge over the Chicago River. I went in the other door to pick up a ticket for the upcoming Amon Amarth concert (which saved me $11.03 vs. Ticketmaster!), and could already hear a band start playing upstairs. Maybe there’s a local opener? Nope, that sounds like Paradise Lost playing already. Crap. I’m not even sure if we’d made it to the 8pm listed start time yet. So then it was back outside to the end of the line, which moved like molasses. When we finally made it through, I dashed up just in time to see them play their last song. At least it was a song I like (“Say Just Words”). The sound seemed really rumbly and muddy, so maybe I didn’t miss that much, but I would have liked the opportunity to judge for myself.

Nightwish came right out of the gate with great sound, and Annette, the new singer, seemed to have the crowd won over in no time. She would sound a bit strained on some of the high parts, but overall, her vocals were excellent throughout the night. In contrast to Tarja’s Opera Ice Queen persona, Annette is a sprightly little thing bouncing around the stage, thankfully stopping just short of embarrassing dance moves or attempts at “metal” poses. It’s funny that after seeing Therion the night before, this is two bands in a row who have switched from cold to warm performances out of their vocalists. I really liked Tarja’s performance the one time I saw her with Nightwish, so one approach isn’t better than the other; it’s just nice to see a different approach. That said, I might have been most impressed by Annette’s pained emotional display during one of the more quiet, introspective songs. I’m pretty sure Tarja would have demanded in-ear monitors that actually fit though, unlike Annette’s that were stuck in with white strips of tape across her ears. Since she was wearing a corset, that means I saw three corset-wearing female metal singers in two nights. C’mon ladies, try something new!

Of course, the new Nightwish presents further proof of the “It’s the songs, not the singer” theory, so pretty much any singer could sing the hooks that Tuomas writes and it would still sound great. I could feel the floor bouncing from the first notes of “Bye Bye Beautiful”, and the sold-out crowd kept it going for most of the night, although, rather surprisingly, a mosh pit never broke out. There were moments between songs where the crowd got nearly silent, which seems odd for a room full of so many obviously-dedicated fans, but maybe they were just knocked speechless or something. It probably didn’t help that the pre-scheduled banter from Marco and Annette usually didn’t make any sense (Annette was rightly quite impressed with the building though). Overall I didn’t see nearly as many young people as I was expecting; maybe us old folks beat them to the tickets.

One thing I want to know is how Tuomas decides what he should play on his keyboards. It seems so pointless to play one particular melody or atmospheric “ooh ahh” part live when there are dozens of pre-recorded backing tracks already filling out the sound. He could play nothing at all and no one would notice. Heck, for all I know, maybe he is faking it. That’s the most annoying thing about seeing heavily-orchestrated bands like this perform “live”: it never feels especially live, with all the sound coming from who-knows-where, and everyone locked down the tempo of the click-track (though Nightwish is good at projecting energy despite those shackles). I think Tuomas should just stand in front like an orchestra conductor and conduct his band, that would be a nice twist.

Despite that annoyance (or maybe because of it?), the band comes off as one of the most “pro” bands that I’ve seen, though maybe not quite to the level they were with Tarja. Still, it’s clear from their stage presence that they’re now an arena-sized band in Europe, so it’s nice to be able to get their American “discount” and see them at relatively small places. I’ll certainly check ’em out again when they come back to Mokena in the spring.

This entry was posted on Sunday, October 28th, 2007 at 7:53 pm and is filed under concert. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.