WOW Just WOW... I'm not at all surprised though.


Courtney Love leads Hole through disastrous 9:30 Club concert

By David Malitz

"You get the Bruce Springsteen set, sorry."

Courtney Love muttered those words at some point during Hole's show Sunday night at the 9:30 club. It's hard to remember exactly when. Time seemed to stand still for so much of the evening. If she meant that we were in for a nearly three-hour concert, then yes, her statement was true. If she meant that we would experience a well-oiled rock-and-roll machine and everybody would leave feeling satisfied they got their money's worth ... let's come back to that one.

It's safe to say the people yelling "Bull[expletive]! This is bull[expletive]!" didn't feel like their $45 was well spent. There were more than a handful of patrons shouting and cursing at the endlessly controversial, occasionally coherent 45-year-old rock trainwreck. Many more simply headed for the exits. Three-quarters-filled at the start, the club was no more than a quarter packed by the excruciating end.

Make no mistake - this was an astonishingly awful performance that had few moments of redeeming musical value. Song titles, lyrics, guitar chords - Love remembered only some of them, and infrequently. Then again, what was really the best-case musical scenario? A competent recreation of songs more than a decade old, played by Love and her latest hired hands? Is that what people wanted to see - Courtney karaoke versions of '90s MTV buzz clips? Maybe. But probably not. Perhaps a bit more professionalism would have been nice but in 2010 you pay your $45 hoping for the Courtney Love Experience. And Sunday night was an experience like no other.

(The painful blow-by-blow, after the jump.)





She took the stage nearly an hour past the advertised 9:30 start time, smoking a cigarette, rambling for a minute about how she was late because she had just been hanging out with a senator friend. (Leave your best guesses in the comments.) She also introduced an assistant, Lisa, who was on stage for the entire show filming Love on an iPhone. Not on the side of the stage. Not filming a few songs. The entire show, on stage, often directly in front of Love. Love, naturally, played to the camera more than her fans. She preened, she constantly sang in its direction, she looked like she was trying to seduce it. Love and Lisa huddled before, during and after songs, conferring about what angles to shoot, like they were Bogdanovich and Kovacs.

When one fan near the front complained that Lisa was being obstructive Love quickly snapped, "[Expletive] you, she's with me." She introduced "Someone Else's Bed" as a "deeply emotional song" and spent the first 30 seconds of it instructing Lisa where to situate herself to get the best angle of Love giving it her faux-heartfelt best.

The between song chatter was more than just chatter. Ten minutes without playing a song? Sure, let's do that a few times. She talked about her courting style ("I never chase"), being anorexic and bulimic, quizzed fans on the meaning of her late husband Kurt Cobain's lyrics, twice mentioned how The Washington Post hated her new album "Nobody's Daughter," and name-dropped a "TMZ" episode's worth of celebrities, from Trent Reznor to Diablo Cody to George Clooney, even Douglas Fairbanks. She asked what the lamest Hole song was and cursed at people when they gave the wrong answer.



When Love got around to singing, her voice sounded as if something died in her throat earlier in the day. Love has a blood-curdling howl, by far her most effective asset as a performer. She just should have used it more on Sunday. During the choruses of "Miss World" and "Violet" - two of her best and most popular songs - she turned the microphone to the crowd and didn't even bother singing. Other times she skipped lines in order to cough, or take a sip of water or just ... not sing. Of the nearly 30 songs (or song fragments), not even a handful were completed without some minor disaster.

Love took a request for "Rock Star" despite admitting she didn't remember how to play it. She stumbled through half the song without strumming anything resembling one correct chord. (Why didn't she just Google the tablature on the iPhone?) She played a new song, "Pretty Your Whole Life." It was bad. Half an hour later she played it again. It was worse.

Love eventually decided to have some of her fans join her on stage. She started plucking some from the crowd and they simply sat off to the side. "Do you really like rock music?" she asked one female. "Because you're African-American. That would be like me being into Lil Wayne." She wasn't joking. One fan came on stage with a poster and asked Love to sign it. "No socializing interaction! Go sit over there."



Before the encore another one of Love's handlers told the remaining faithful that they would have to be loud because there was someone who was waiting to have sex with Love and it would take lots of applause to get her to delay that appointment. Sure enough Love did re-emerge, this time wearing a skin-colored see-through top, sans bra. It would have been blurred out on TV, even on E!

She quickly became self-conscious and asked the audience for a bra, promising unlimited merchandise to whoever gave her one. One came flying onto the stage and Love removed her top to put it on. She did this at the back corner of the stage, so we could only see her bare back. She then repeatedly talked about how the bra was too big for her.

The encore contained a Rolling Stones cover (the second of the night), a Leonard Cohen cover ("Take This Longing") and the back-to-back of originals "Car Crash" and "Awful." Was this irony or were we well past that? Most of her backing band had retired for the night by this point leaving Love and guitarist Micko Larkin alone on stage. Then came a cover of Big Star's "Thirteen" that likely had Alex Chilton doing 360s in his grave. Before closer "Northern Lights" she ripped off the bra. Obviously. It's actually somewhat surprising she didn't play Nirvana's "Pennyroyal Tea" while completely topless.

"This is a really weird show," Love said in perhaps the understatement of the night a bit earlier. "I can't tell if it's really terrible."

Courtney, let me tell you something. In just the past year and a half, I've been to about 400 shows. I've seen some really terrible ones. And this was really the most terrible. No question. But the vast majority of those 400 shows, I went there, I saw it, and almost immediately forgot I was there. I'll never forget this night with Courtney Love, no matter how much I may want to. And isn't that really what she's always wanted?

I was thinking of posting this, but I don't really care about Hole so I'm glad someone else did. To wake up and read this in the paper this morning was shocking, but not unexpected. I don't think I've ever seen an article as scathing as this one in the Washington Post.

tl;dr

but I still would,

She played a new song, "Pretty Your Whole Life." It was bad. Half an hour later she played it again. It was worse.

Some people get genuine joy from a sunset. Others from the sound of a child's laughter. Others still the warm touch of a lover's hand. Some people get genuine joy from puppies or kittens or hearing their favorite song on the radio.

For me... genuine joy is Courtney Love collapsing. It makes me so happy every time she does this stupid shit. Needless to say... I'm happy a lot.

LOL @ her playing Leonard Cohen's "Take This Longing". I want to hear that.

I'm sure you don't.

you know...you're alright man

But maybe you need new things in your life.

Man, I actually groaned out loud when I read that. SO cringeworthy.

You guys must be lonely motherfuckers to care this much about Courtney Love. Hasn't she been irrelevant since she murdered that drug addict?

I heard it. It's bad.

Vedder has a blood-curdling howl, by far his most effective asset as a performer. He just should have used it more on Sunday. During the chorus of "Betterman" - one of his best and most popular songs - he turned the microphone to the crowd and didn't even bother singing. Other times he skipped lines in order to cough, or take a sip of water or just ... not sing.

Damn Chud, what's happening to you? You used to be semi-witty at least, did the whole mod thing go to your head or something? Come on man, you're worth a lot more than that.

Wait? What? CHud? Mod? Did I miss something?

I LOL'd, chud.

For real?

Thanks, spenno. One day I will make Mr. Bateman laugh.