Last night at the Nokia Theater in L.A. we saw the “Hell Pop” tour with In This Moment, Motionless in White, KYNG and All Hail the Yeti. This was the final night of the tour with this line-up, so we were fortunate enough to catch it here in L.A.

The last time we came down to see a show here in L.A. was for the Monster Energy Outbreak Tour at the end of September which was also at the Nokia Theater. We decided that we very much liked this venue and would come down and see shows here as often as we could. We arrived fairly early (as usual) and were quite surprised that there was really no line-up at the entrance to speak of. We thought we were way early, but it was only a half hour until the doors were to open. It turned out that it must have been a bad night to schedule a show (night before Thanksgiving) as they did not sell enough tickets and instead of letting us sit in our incredibly awesome seats in the balcony, they kept the balcony closed and gave us pit tickets instead. We were a little bummed out at first, but scored ourselves a good vantage point just to the right of center stage at the second level rail so we didn’t have anyone standing in front of us.

The first band on was All Hail the Yeti. There are a few new bands throughout the year where we are surprised on how good they turn out to be and these guys were one of these bands. They were incredibly powerful and full of energy. They really got the crowd pumped and started the night of great music. Nicki and I went and visited them at their merch. table after their set to meet them and get their CD. We talked with the guys for a little while and had them sign a poster for us. They were a great group of guys who clearly love doing what they do and very much appreciate their fans.

Next up was KYNG who were also surprisingly good. These guys didn’t have the typical thrash metal sound to them. There was no screaming, but more of a vintage vibe reminiscent of Metallica, Led Zeppelin and Sound Garden. They did a great rendition of Van Halen’s Hot For Teacher, actually nailed it! Interesting how many of the kids in the audience had no idea this was a cover until the band told them.

Motionless In White came up next. These guys were actually the reason why we were at the show. They are Nicki’s favorite band (or at least one of her top 5). With the exception of the equipment issues that they were having (which they handled very well), they were epic. They opened with “Synthetic Love” which was a great opening song that set the energy level for the rest of their set. One of the best songs they played was an acoustic version of “Sinematic” featuring Tim Skull on the guitar. This song by no means is a soft acoustic song, but Chris Motionless performed it with incredible emotion and passion. They also did a mind-blowing version of “Abigail” which they didn’t play live when we saw them at the Mayhem Festival over this past summer. They closed their set with their anti establishment anthem “A-M-E-R-I-C-A” featuring Michael Vampire of Vampires Everywhere! accompanying Chris Motionless on lead vocals. This band has a great stage performance with Balz’ keyboard stand raising, lowering and spinning throughout the show and the incredibly hypnotic and entrancing Ghost on the Bass.

Finally, In This Moment came on and put on a great show with an incredible stage show. Maria Brink (lead vocals) came out and performed in her usual distinctive and suggestive style, which the guys in the crowd are obviously drawn to. They performed their top songs from the Blood album opening up with “Adrenalize” and of course playing many of their older songs as well. One of the most memorable performances had to be “Into the Light” where Maria performed sitting in a chair in center stage under blue spot lighting and swirling fog.

One of the highlights to the night was when Ashley Costello – vocals and Nikki Misery – guitar of New Years Day showed up right next to where we were standing. Both Nicki and Ryan rushed over to meet them and have their photos taken with them. What a treat this was. We saw them perform at Warped this past summer and they became one of our favorite bands.

Wednesday October 2nd we went into town to see the Outbreak Festival at the Seattle stop. The Showbox SODO is a much smaller venue that the Club Nokia in LA when we saw the show on Saturday. This was another special show in a couple of different  aspects, one was that we were able to meet Black Veil Brides prior to the show. The other being that William Control came out and sang with BVB during both the songs Shadows Die and In the End.

We arrived to the show a little early and had to pull the kids out of class to make it to Seattle by 4:00 which was the time we were told to meet in front of the venue for our meet and greet session with the band. We were second in line and we were all pretty excited to actually meet the guys we have seen already three times this year at various concerts. As we were waiting in line we heard Andy asked the other guys “we have to find out who Jenna is” and then CC spoke up and asked those of us in the front of the group “who is Jenna” which happened to be Nicki’s friend who came with us to the show. Apparently Andy looked through the list of VIP’s and chose her to make a personal call to. Unfortunately, she was with us on the way to the show when he called so he actually spoke to her mother who had no idea who and what he was talking about… she eventually clued in realizing who he was and gave him Jenna’s cell phone number… she is still waiting for him to call. One of the pictures above is of Ryan’s admit slip excusing him from class early that he had the guys from the band sign…Ryan figured this would get him excused for sure.

This show seemed a little better than the LA show maybe because of the size and relative intimacy of the venue or perhaps that the LA show was the first of the tour and they were getting the kinks out, not really sure but all the bands seemed cleaner and more polished. It was very cool to have members of all the bands including Michael Paget (lead guitar for Bullet for My Valentine) walking through the crowd and standing with us all enjoying the other acts. James Clark (lead vocals from Throw the Fight) seemed to spend more time in the crowd than he did on stage, and we even saw Becca from Stars in Stereo a few times.

This was another great show and we had an awesome time.

Went to LA from Seattle to see the first night of the Monster Energy Outbreak Tour featuring Black Veil Brides and Bullet For My Valentine.

We spent the morning and afternoon in downtown LA enjoying the sights and doing some shopping, arriving back to the hotel about an hour before the doors opened at 6:00.

This was out first time to the Club Nokia at LA Live and we were all very impressed with the layout, ease of entry and overall atmosphere. Our seats were on the mezzanine with only one row of seats in front of us separated by the aisle way. The mezzanine section had a pretty good incline allowing for an unobstructed view of the stage below, and as there was no one sitting in the row in front of us, we were able to relax and watch/listen without leaving our very comfortable chairs. We all agreed that we would definitely see another show at this venue anytime (actually planning our next trip now).

The show started promptly at 6:30 with a new band called Throw The Fight followed by a band named Stars in Stereo. Both were good heavy rock bands, however it was clear that the crowd was there to see BVB and Bullet. Black Veil Brides came on and put on their typical, awesome show. They started with Shadows Die, then I am Bulletproof followed by Nobody’s Hero then Fiend Club (cover of the 80’s Misfits song), Let You Down, Wretched and Divine, The Legacy then Fallen Angels with the last song of their set being In The End which was by far their BEST (according to me – Nicki thinks this is too overplayed and her favorite was The Fiend Club). Bullet For My Valentine came on about 45 minutes after BVB left the stage and tore the place apart. The place just roared, with moshes breaking out during every song. We even saw something we had never seen at a show before… we are used to the typical crowd surfing, but these people were crowd chucking. A couple people would somehow throw the person over about 6 rows of people toward the stage landing on the unexpecting fans who promptly surfed them to the rail.. Very amazing sight to see, except for one guy who got hurled in from the back and landed flat on the in an area devoid of people to catch him (he got up and started moshing, so we presumed he was OK). We didn’t memorize the set list for Bullet, but two that we remembered for sure were Riot and Tears Don’t Fall as their encore.

This concert was a great set-up for when we see the same show again in Seattle on Wednesday, October 2nd at the Showbox SODO. We have BVB meet and greet for this show, so are really looking forward to that.