With both Tool and A Perfect Circle, singer Maynard James Keenan preferred to perform in the background. He was often little more than a silhouette as the other members in those bands – both of which play a heady, aggressive form of prog rock – toiled away in the foreground. His other band Puscifer, which stopped at the Lakewood Civic Auditorium last night, Keenan comes out of his shell.
The different approach was apparent right from the start of the 90-minute show as Keenan single-handedly pulled small Airstream trailer out onto the stage and then set up a few lawn chairs and picnic tables. He made a few remarks about sustainability and the need to start thinking differently about the environment before his band mates joined him and he launched into “The Green Valley.” While Keenan then spent the majority of the show at the back of the stage, there was something about the show that was slightly more inviting (maybe that had something to do with the camping motif) about the whole thing. A mix of Southwestern imagery (Keenan owns a winery in the Arizona ghost town of Jerome) was displayed on a giant video screen behind the stage. For being a DIY affair, this show had all the trappings of an arena rock gig.
Sure, Keenan still sounded creepy as hell on “Vagina Mine” and “Rev 22:20,” but that’s to be expected. Those songs are creepy. But the often-funny skits between songs that featured video taped segments of Keenan dissing other celebs made the show a more casual affair, even though the terrific six-piece band never let up on the aural assault (that was delivered with sonic precision, by the way). After the main set, the band took the lazy way out and sat at a picnic table rather than “playing grab ass backstage,” before coming out for an encore that concluded with the walloping “Tumbleweed,” suggesting that anyone who dismisses Puscifer as a frivolous sideproject has got it all wrong.
-Jeff Niesel