April 30, 2013: How to destroy angels

Concert Details:

Bands: How to destroy angels, Diiv

Location: Fillmore Silver Spring, Silver Spring, MD

Trent Reznor

1. The Wake-Up
2. Keep it Together
3. Parasite
4. And the Sky Began to Scream
5. Ice Age
6. The Believers
7. How Long?
8. Welcome Oblivion
9. BBB
10. The Space in Between
11. Fur-Lined
12. The Loops Closes
13. A Drowning

Encore: 

   14. On the Wing

   15. Strings and attractors

   16. We Fade Away

How to destroy angels is a band that consists of Trent Reznor, his wife Mariqueen Maandig, his long time collaborator and Nine Inch Nails producer Atticus Ross, graphic designer who has worked with Nine Inch Nails, Rob Sheridan, and Nine Inch Nails touring member Alessandro Cortini, but let me be clear, this was not a Nine Inch Nails show.

This show was as much about the music as it was about the theatrical aspect of the show.  At the beginning of the show the band stood behind a curtain of beads, the lights bouncing through them and illuminating the band.  There was almost a palpable fear in the audience that the curtain would never be pulled back and that we would never really see the band, almost as if the curtain was there because what we were seeing, hearing and feeling was only an illusion.

 I don't remember exactly when, but around the third song the curtain was pulled back and the lead singer, Mariqueen Maandig stepped forward to the front of the stage.  She has a wonderfully beautiful and at the same time haunting voice.  It would be hard to describe what type of music they play, but to me it feels like an necessary evolution of industrial rock of Nine Inch Nails crossed with folk music.

Mariqueen Maandig, lead singer of How To Destroy Angels

The haunting beauty of Mariqueen's voice was no more apparent than during Ice Age, when she summoned so much emotion in the song that she was brought to tears.

Another song worth pointing out was Welcome Oblivion which they used the curtain to emphasize the song.  The song itself almost sounds if she is singing from the bottom of a well and during the song she was clawing at the curtain as if she was trying to escape.  

The crowd, like myself, were there because of Trent Reznor.  I doubt many in the room would have picked up the album if he wasn't involved, even if he never plays the role of lead singer.  He never once stepped forward to sing on his own, and only played backup or co-singer, but he was very aware of the crowd being there to see him, and towards the end of the show finally addressed the show, thanking them for their support and introducing the band.

In addition to the music, as seen in the pictures, the show was very much about the visual, below are the rest of the pictures I took for the show that came out well.

 

This show was the reason I have begun bringing a camera to shows and the in hindsight I regret not bringing one to every other show I went to before this.  I don't know if I would see the band again but I would definitely be interesting in seeing any show that Trent Reznor was involved in, not just Nine Inch Nails.