Queens of the Stone Age rolled in to a sold out Red Rocks Amphitheatre Tuesday October 10th, midway through a North American tour in support of Villains, their latest studio release. This was the twelfth and final Red Rocks show of the season for me, and a show I was very much looking forward to since the day it was announced. After a snowstorm hit the Denver metro the day before, forcing the previous night’s show to be relocated to an indoor venue, a clear and crisp evening greeting QOTSA fans.
Royal Blood
UK duo, Royal Blood is currently riding the wave of How Did We Get So Dark?, their excellent recently released second LP. Drummer Ben Thatcher and bassist/vocalist Mike Kerr worked their way through an energetic ten song opening set to a full house. Thatcher and Kerr catered to old and new fans by evenly splitting the setlist between How Did We Get So Dark? and their self-titled first album, including favorites “Lights Out”, “Figure It Out”, “Hook, Line & Sinker”, and “I Only Lie When I Love You.” I’m sold on this band, and they set the mood perfectly for QOTSA’s headlining set!
Queens of the Stone Age
Look, Queens of the Stone Age could have plucked any mix of 22 songs from their vaults and this would have been one of the best concerts of the year for me. From the first notes of opener “Feet Don’t Fail Me”, when Josh Homme strutted onto the stage, he and his bandmates had this crowd in the palms of their hands. Between his awe of the natural venue, comparing his sense of the earth’s energy with that of the desert where he’s from, to his parental advice with a pregnant fan in the front row, Homme’s banter was on point throughout the night.
I’ll spare you the full play-by-play (listen to the playlist below), but about that setlist. New and old songs flowed perfectly between the groove of Villains treats like “Un-Reborn Again”, Era Vulgaris classic “Make It Wit Chu”, and “Go With The Flow” to nasty rockers “Domesticated Animals”, “Sick, Sick, Sick”, and “No One Knows”, and everything in between. By the time the last notes of “Song For The Dead” rang off the walls, the band had covered at least one song from eight different Queens of the Stone Age albums, and the vibe felt like 9,500 utterly satisfied music fans just had the best Tuesday night of their lives. Bottom line, there’s no other band I would have rather seen on my last Red Rocks concert of the season.
“This is a great representation of how the fuck to live and how the fuck to be”
– Josh Homme, Queens of the Stone Age, Oct 10, 2017, Red Rocks Amphitheatre, Morrison, CO
Queens of the Stone Age, Oct 10, 2017, Red Rocks Amphitheatre, Morrison – Photo by Mitch Kline
Queens of the Stone Age, Oct 10, 2017, Red Rocks Amphitheatre, Morrison, CO Setlist
Feet Don’t Fail Me, First It Giveith, Avon, The Evil Has Landed, My God Is The Sun, Smooth Sailing, Domesticated Animals, The Way You Used To Do, Leg of Lamb, I Appear Missing, Villains of Circumstance, Little Sister, Un-Reborn Again, If I Had A Tail, Make It Wit Chu, I Sat In The Ocean, Sick, Sick, Sick, Go With The Flow, No One Knows
Encore:
Fortress, Head Like a Haunted House, Song For The Dead
THE SPREAD
Villains: 7 Songs
…Like Clockwork: 5 Songs
Songs For The Deaf: 4 Songs
Era Vulgaris: 2 Songs
Rated R: 1 Song
Queens of the Stone Age: 1 Song
Lullabies To Paralyze: 1 Song
The Evil Has Landed: 1 Song
Royal Blood, Oct 10, 2017, Red Rocks Amphitheatre, Morrison, CO – Photo by Mitch Kline
Royal Blood, Oct 10, 2017, Red Rocks Amphitheatre, Morrison, CO Setlist
Where Are You Now?, Lights Out, Come On Over, I Only Lie When I Love You, Hole In Your Heart, Little Monster, Hook, Line & Sinker, Loose Change, Figure It Out, Out Of The Black
Queens of the Stone Age continue the North American trek of their Villains Tour with Royal Blood through Oct 24, with stops in Kansas City, St Paul, Milwaukee, Detroit, Indianapolis, Washington DC, Boston, Portland, ME, and New York City before a month long European tour. All upcoming Queens of the Stone Age tour dates, merch, and info can be found at qotsa.com
Royal Blood can be found at royalbloodband.com
All photos by Mitch Kline.