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Could someone out there please let Aaron Lewis know he's a Rock God? For virtually all of this Staind Live From Mohegan Sun Blu-ray, captured on November 25, 2011 as the band set out on tour for the first time with their then new drummer Sal Giancarelli, Lewis seems to be largely unaware that he's performing before throngs of screaming fans. He's incredibly "interior" for the bulk of this concert, literally hanging on to the microphone and stand with his eyes firmly shut, singing as if to satisfy some inner muse and evidently not caring one whit about the more or less real world "out there". When Lewis does open his eyes and make contact with the audience, it's in ironic moments like his solo rendition of "Country Boy", a narrative song which sums up Lewis' philosophy as more or less, "I ain't no rock star, so don't try to pigeonhole me that way." In an interview included on this Blu-ray as a supplement, the band seems both slightly amazed but ultimately nonplussed that they're celebrating their seventeenth year as successful musicians. Staind is yet another band that came up through the trenches their own way, self-releasing their first album (with evidently only 4,000 units pressed, which sold out quickly, according to the same interview), and then matriculating into a more relatively mainstream presence, with several gold and platinum albums resulting (including a handful that have made it all the way to Number 1 on the Billboard charts), and some moderately successful singles, as well as one standout chart buster, "It's Been Awhile". But through it all, Lewis has seemed almost preternaturally unaffected by fame and fortune. He isn't a swaggering hard rock bad boy, like so many others in this genre. He does indeed seem more like a "good ol' boy", a simple backwoods guy who doesn't have anything to prove and leaves the stage antics to his bandmates while he closes his eyes and croons to some unseen entity.
Mohegan Sun is one of those giant casino cum performance venues that have blossomed throughout the United States in some sort of bizarre but obviously profitable attempt to return to various Native American tribes some semblance of all that was taken from them in the days of "Eminent Domain". This particular development has a fairly immense arena, one which seats some 12,000 people, and while it isn't clear just how many "seats" are taken in this Staind concert (seating being a relative term since most of the audience is standing for the bulk of the concert), there's little doubt there are several thousand fans in attendance.
The band's stage presence is at once electrifying but also strangely low key at times. Aside from Lewis, who seems to be in his own private world, lead guitarist Mike Murshok and bassist Johnny April are the main visual attractions. Both with longish hair, and prone to thrashing around in time with the music so that their tresses wave to and fro rhythmically, they provide a kind of odd visual counterpoint to Lewis' "stick in the mud" approach. But in terms of sheer visceral energy, there's little doubt that newish drummer Sal Giancarelli wins the Gold Medal. Giancarelli is an incredibly aggressive percussionist, whacking out formidable beats with precision and an almost manic approach, as if he's trying to subdue his drum set into submission.
While Staind has achieved a certain reputation in the hard rock world, the really interesting thing throughout this concert is seeing how seemingly more receptive the audience is to the band's "kinder, gentler" side in its ballads or less aggressive offerings. There seems to be considerably more response to outings like the aforementioned "Country Boy" (where Lewis goes seriously out of tune with his vocals before regaining his footing) and "Outside" than their more down and dirty tunes. Another kind of funny thing that becomes evident in this concert is Lewis' voice, which has often been compared to Eddie Vedder's. Some out there may think I'm just slightly off my rocker when I say this, but listen carefully to this concert and see if you don't agree that at times Lewis sounds surprisingly like a just slightly more gravelly Hootie from Hootie and the Blowfish. I know that has probably just blown Staind's rock "street cred" for some, but by about halfway through this entertaining if non-showy live performance, it was a comparison I couldn't help but make.
Staind Live From the Mohegan Sun contains the following songs:
01. Eyes Wide Open
02. Falling
03. Right Here
04. Throw It All Away
05. Spleen
06. Fade
07. Failing
08. So Far Away
09. Crawl
10. Country Boy
11. For You
12. Paper Wings
13. Outside
14. Not Again
15. It's Been Awhile
16. Mudshovel
17. Something to Remind You
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