Last night, the Bryce Jordan Center hosted four bands that featured heavy, distorted guitars, machine-gun-like drums and terrible names.
Korn finally hit the stage about three hours after the concert began, getting the crowd fully pumped up with "Here to Stay." Korn played a healthy mix of new songs off their more recent albums and classics like "Falling Away From Me," "Dead Bodies Everywhere," and their first mega-hit "Freak on a Leash."
While musically the entire band was spot on, it became quickly apparent that Jonathan Davis,
lead singer, had one too many backstage.
"Who wants a f---in' beer in here? I'll take 12," Davis said. Instead of banter with the crowd between songs, Davis, decked out with his signature knee socks and kilt, slurred his words like a drunk girl who had one too many Mike's Hard Lemonades.
Five Finger Death Punch kicked off the concert, displaying their affinity toward the human hand -- with their huge logo of a hand with a skull in the middle -- and churning out songs like "White Knuckles." I even think the name of their album is Day of the Fist.
The lead singer of FFDP did his best to make sure that everyone thought he was a big tough metal singer.
At one point he told the audience, "I've been beaten, I've been stabbed but nothing hurts more than...," and all of a sudden he moved away from the mic. I wondered what he said and my friend next to me said, "heartburn?"
The singer seemed ready to give out a five finger death punch to the entire audience for not "participating" in their artificial mosh pits. There's nothing wrong with an opening band occasionally resorting to checking in with the audience to make sure they're awake, but Death Punch took it a little overboard. Listen, buddy, what did you expect? The BJC sold out for Nickelback, not Pantera.
Droid took the stage second, displaying bland metal that didn't excite anyone. The singer of this band wasn't nearly as angry with the audience for not moshing and displayed a whole lot more energy. Unfortunately, the only word I could understand during his screaming was the F-bomb.
The bassist of Droid made a complete ass out of himself on two occasions: First when he made it clear he didn't know what city he was in and referred to the State College audience as "Pennsylvania," and then, later on, when he informed the crowd that he wanted "every guy with balls in that pit right now!"
Okay, buddy, I'll let the testicular cancer ward know that they should hang back for this one.
After Droid and Five Finger Fruit Punch, the crowd seemed to be growing tiresome of insipid death metal, but when HELLYEAH hit the stage, the crowd was fired up.
Featuring the lead singer of Mudvayne and Vinnie Paul Abbot, drummer of Pantera and brother of Dimebag Darrell, HELLYEAH electrified the crowd with a good mixture of metal and hard rock. An actual acoustic guitar even made its way onstage for the song "Alcohol and Ass." I never thought I'd see hundreds of people holding up lighters for a song entitled "Alcohol and Ass," but, by God, now I've seen everything.
A not quite touching but commendable part of HELLYEAH's performance was when the band had the entire crowd give a "Hell yeah!" in the memory of Abbot's brother Dimebag Darrell, who was shot onstage at a concert.
Even though Korn may have been blitzed, they still provided a great show for their fans complete with an impressive lightshow and plenty of intense, high-energy rock. For $20, the fans turned out to be the real winners last night.
