Fear Factory & Godflesh @ Nottingham Rock City. November 5 2001

Maybe this one needs a wee background for where I'm coming from tonight.

Well, this gig happened on a Tuesday. Monday morning at 9 I arrive in work. During the day it transpires a virus has caused a few problems on machines. Fast forward through stress, to 1am Tuesday morning, when I leave work. 6am Tuesday morning I'm back in work to finish the job off. 6pm Tuesday I leave work. I've had about 2 hours sleep since Monday morning, am stressed and a touch knackered. 8pm Tuesday, get to Rock City to see this lot.

Find a place as close to the back of the venue as I possibly can, where there's a pillar to prop me up just in case. Godflesh take to the stage. They came, they played. I'm in no real state to take it in and fully enjoy (or hate) it.

After a wait of however long it was, Fear Factory take to the stage. Seen them a number of times now, and my impression / enjoyment has decreased each time. Last time I remember being sceptical about how much of it was live. There's still an element of that going on, though this time Burton sounds rough enough to believe he's live. It's just that Fear Factory for me have lost the special something. Things start off well, with some tracks from Demanufacture, Self Bias Resistor especially still being a great song (though the riff didn't sound as clear and precise as before. It's as though the sound has been muddied abit in as things downtune.

But it's just that it feels like a going through the motions. "You have a good time say yeah, you haveing a fucking great time say hell yeah" or something similar intones Bell a few times during the course of the evening. "You all tired and want to go home to sleep?" noooooo replies the crowd. Except one. Yes please. I really really REALLY do need a good nights sleep. Guess what, "you fat bastard" is yelled at Dino. Yawn. New tracks come and go, I'm sorry, I don't know the names. "You going to help me raise the dead? This is Resurrection", and guess what, Resurrection is played. The dead remain dead. I remain tired. Martyr takes us "back to 1992", the heay emphasis on 2. I move to the side of the venue, mainly cos I need water to help in keeping me awake. It looks more and more well, boring. They depart. They don't play Dog Day Sunrise as was promised. I get out of there as quickly as I can. I'm sorry, I only bought my ticket on the Saturday, not realising the shit was going to hit the fan on the Monday. I made a decision to go see the gig on the Tuesday. For my sake, I shouldn't have bothered.