Eagles Of Death Metal – Powerstation: August 5, 2023

Eagles Of Death Metal rocked Auckland’s Powerstation last night. The 13th Floor’s Simon Coffey and Brenna Jo Gotje were there to cover this momentous event.

Eagles of Death Metal were born out of the infamous (and very collectable) Josh Homme (Queens Of The Stone Age) curated (The) Desert Sessions vinyl colabs in the 1990’s, Eagles of Death Metal were co-founded by Jesse Hughes and Josh Homme (who unfortunately rarely plays live with them anymore), and have, through the band’s history, featured such luminary members as Dave Grohl, Jack Black, Nick Oliveri, Taylor Hawkins and Liam Lynch. The band’s live lineup for tonight’s show was (of course) Jesse Hughes on guitar and vocals, with longtime member Jennie Vee on bass, and two new live touring members, Leah Bluestein on drums, and Scott Shiflett on guitar. 

Eagles of Death Metal last Rock N Rolled in Aotearoa/New Zealand in 2016, not long after the horrific terrorist attack at their show in Paris in 2015. Consequently at the 2016 show, punters were subject to metal detector checks and pat downs for weapons as they attended, much too their puzzlement and mirthful mutterings.

Tonight’s show sold out long ago, no surprise given band leader Jesse Hughes’ enthusiasm at connecting and interacting with audiences, with a slew of bangers to choose from, including  I Only Want You, Cherry Cola, I Want You So Hard and Speaking in Tongues, the night was set for a another memorable night out for Eagles of Death Metal fans.

Grown Downz

Mount Maunganui two piece Punk & Roll band Grown Downz are siblings Joel and Ellie who formed Grown Downz in late 2017. Joel sings and plays guitar, while Ellie is on the drums. Enthusiastic! Energised! Stoked! Were from Tauranga we’re stoked to be here or something like that flows from Joel’s voice in between songs. They play a mixture of hardcore punk and melody influenced possibly by The Cramps. As their set lengthens, it’s apparent that their sound is monolithic, without bass or another guitar their songs lack subtlety or juxtapose. Joel is having to mahi so hard on guitar that his vocals get lost in the noise, possibly an accent impact? And they end just about every song the same way, which takes away from their obvious skills as musicians. Yes they were impacting, yes a part of the audience were taken on a ride, but like the proposed Springfield monorail, they just end up going nowhere fast.

Eagles of Death Metal

The wait is boring, yes seasoned punters know the crew needs to check everything twice and thrice, but at least the wait is partially ameliorated by the sounds of Iggy Pop, The Clash, Primal Scream and the Sex Pistols  blasting out of the PA stacks until… 

The house lights dimmed and the stage burst with colour, the sonics of Time Warp from The Rocky Horror Picture Show in the filled to capacity room harking the coming of the main event, the capacity crowd surges to the front in anticipation. As a satin-caped avenger dressed all in white, hams it up on stage, looking like a modern day Lief Garrett figure, with bassist Jennie Vee wowing like a 1970’s Charlie’s Angel, guitarist Scott Shiflett (who is the brother of Christopher Shiflett from the Foo Fighters) assailing the stage, posed like a character from The Warriors, and hidden behind a 25” bass drum, Leah Bluestein is the mystery member.

Jesse Hughes is the circus ring leader, right from the start he takes the room under control and leads them down the yellow brick road. While he may amble around the stage like a southern Baptist preacher, the words coming out of his mouth are invariably dominated not by scripture and speaking in tongues, but by motherfucker, muthafuker and I love you people (or similar). Early on, after a blistering version of I Only Want You, Hughes demands the lights come up so he can see the faces of the muthafuckers that sold out the last show of the tour, preaching his love for them and the country they are from, (sic) “…it’s the end of the tour and i wanna shake my dick ..”

With two new band members onboard, Leah Bluestein on drums, and Scott Shiflett on guitar, the opportunity to weave an epiphanic tale of  bringing Leah into the fold that went something like ‘statues… folly… blue fairy… a real gal… plays the drums like a muthafucker.” Later on Scott gets to show off his prowess, as he battled Jesse in a theatrically foppish parody of the duelling banjos, and jammed some Led Zeppelin riffs much to the crowd’s delight.

The band are in on the showmanship, the theatrics, the clowning around, as they create the blues ridden garage punk of energy that envelopes all in the room tonight. It’s obvious many aspects of the show have been carefully choreographed, but it seems fresh and spontaneous as Jesse Hughes continually narrates the night of every 70s cliche showman pose. With a vast array of songs to choose from, EoDM are rewarding their fans with a set packed full of hits, as they plough through, a blistering version of Complexity is followed by a grooving and moving version of Silverlake with obligatory crowd sing-a-along.

Somewhere earlyish in the show, Jesse can’t helps himself, and he dedicates all the songs he’s written to all the women of the world, and launches into a sickly-sweet version of Cherry Cola followed spritely by the bone-jarring and hip-shaking I Want You So Hard (Boy’s Bad News), such an infectious song (only marred due to the lack of Josh Homme on stage tonight) the Schmaltzy I Love You All the Time is preceded about a heartfelt-release about following his mama’s wisdom, to love someone everyday of the week, not just on Wednesday and Thursday, for some reason i kept envisioning we were on the set of Happy Days.

Clothes, lots of clothes kept appearing onstage, jackets, hoodies, Hughes, plays the game and claims ownership of them all ‘Your not getting these back muthafuckers, they’re mine now’ But the pièce de résistance is the arrival of a bra , ‘Now we’re cooking with gas’ exclaim Hughes, well, then there’s the golden sparkly waistcoat that top the wardrobe additions, Hughes is really rather taken by it.

As the night comes to finale, EoDM roll out a staple cover, David Bowie’s 1972 classic Moonage Daydream, which given that EoDM and Jesse Hughes whole schtick is mired in gender-bender 70’s rhetoric and hommage, fits perfectly and thankfully, and to the rooms delight EoDM jam out a magnificent version of it. There’s still room for more love, as the band do the obligatory faux show ending, Jesse comes back out and regails that he demanded from the manager that the play one more fucking song. Speaking In Tongues transforms the room once again, into a blue-light disco of old, the four onstage are still having fun, and the 1000 on the floor are in rapture, as the show turns into a duelling banjo spectacle (see earlier for details) and finishes with a girl-on-girl, Drum n Bass segment of Ace of Spades (Motorhead)

Once again the travelling stage-show of Eagles of Death Metal converted tonight’s mass of post-teenagers to the book of never-ending partying, the word of Jesse Hughes is scripture.

Simon Coffey

Click on any image to view a photo gallery by Brenna Jo Gotje

Eagles Of Death Metal:

Grown Downz:

• • Setlist:

    
    Got a Woman

  • I Only Want You
  • Don’t Speak (I Came to Make a Bang!)
  • Anything ‘Cept the Truth
  • Complexity 
  • Silverlake (K.S.O.F.M.)
  • Heart On
  • Secret Plans
  • Cherry Cola
  • Flames Go Higher
  • Now I’m a Fool
  • I Want You So Hard (Boy’s Bad News)
  • Whorehoppin’ (Shit, Goddamn)
  • I Love You All the Time
  • Moonage Daydream

• Encore:

• Speaking in Tongues