Shinedown headlined the Carnival of Madness for the second time since the event’s inception in 2010, headlining that year as well. Papa Roach, Skillet, In This Moment and We As Human have all signed on to tour with Shinedown in all their respective first appearances with Carnival of Madness.
Shinedown performed before a packed house in Clarkston, MI Tuesday for the Carnival of Madness (Photo by Damien Dennis, 2013).
There is no doubt as to why Shinedown was chosen to headline the fourth annual Carnival. Brent Smith, Barry Kerch, Eric Bass and Zach Myers put on the best performance of the night, hands down.
Shinedown held a command over the audience that could best be described as puppet masters. From their first song, “I’m Not Alright” to their finale with their first single off Amaryllis “Bully,” Smith held the crowd in the palm of his hand.
After the first song of the set, Smith asked the crowd to look to the person left of them and then to the person on the right and introduce themselves to each other. Smith called the audience one big family of brothers and sisters.
He even introduced himself to every photographer in the photo pit in front of stage, a true class act.
“Enemies” and “Devour rounded out the top portion of the set, which consisted of 14 songs for nearly 90-minutes.
Shinedown performed a variety of hits from Sound of Madness and Amaryllis, including the title track from the former to kick off the encore performance.
A unique moment occurred after their performance of “Sound of Madness” where Smith and Myers were both on stage alone.
Bassist Eric Bass plays with passion during Shinedown’s Carnival of Madness performance (Photo by Damien Dennis, 2013).
“It’s been one of those days, man,” Smith said. “When it rains, it pours.” He went on to explain that their bassist, Bass, received news that his 11 year old dog Griffin had passed away earlier in the day. Smith asked Bass to come out on stage, gave him a hug and dedicated the song they were about to play to Eric Bass and his dog along with the fans.
As Myers played acoustic guitar, Smith belted out their hit Lynyrd Skynyrd cover of “Simple Man” from their first album.
Near the latter end of the song, Smith said that he will raise his hand, and the louder the fans scream, the higher his hand will go and the harder he will sing. The crowd was deafening as the duo finished the song.
The set ended with the band returning to the stage to perform “Bully.”
Despite the great stage presence of the band and the use of pyrotechnics and fire, it may have been noticeable to long time fans that the band failed to play anything from their second album Us and Them, and just the cover song from Leave A Whisper.
While it is understandable for them not to play a lot from those albums, a Shinedown performance that fails to involve their hit “45” from the first album and either “Save Me,” “I Dare You” or “Heroes” from the second leaves a lot to be desired.
But that did little to hinder the performance. The foursome had a great deal of energy and passion during the performance, while getting the fans involved in one way or another throughout the night. Shinedown is definitely at the top of the Rock & Roll game in 2013.
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*All photos by Damien Dennis
