© Raquel Pinheiro
Raw Power
words & photos: Raquel Pinheiro
There are front row seats and then there is from row standing by the stage, almost upon it, with Nick Oliveri a few centimeters from you. Or crouched, leaning against the stage monitor that happens to be on the floor. Either way, surrounded by fellow concert goers, gathered in a semi-circle, all going with the flow (pun intended). Flow, in your face, straightforward, energetic, speed up, semi-calmness interrupted by loud, abrupt screams or a shouting shortly broken by some mellowness are some ways of describing Nick Oliveri’s concert at Hard Rock Cafe in Porto.
It is Nick, dressed in black trousers and trainers and dark green t-shirt with a Nick giving a middle finger salute, an acoustic-electric guitar, a microphone, a raspy voice, and us. There are no barriers, no middle-men. We’re there, absorbing the rawness, feeling the sway of the floor boards, our jumpiness and singing along, dancing, grooving as on full gear as the man on stage. It’s a give and take from both sides, feeding from each other energy.
From Kuyuss’ Green Machiche till the end of the encore, Nick’s head, forehead and guitar become increasingly wet and sweaty, glittering water lines running down the black wood body. Between beginning and end there are Kuyss, Mondo Generator, Queens of the Stone Age songs, and boy do those songs rock the boat and throw us for a loop. Oliveri’s delivery is fearless, down to earth, to the heights of true punkness veering into daredevilness, or totally diving into it. At a point, my notebook gets a spit, or was it a drop of sweat? Both?
By Feel Good Hit of The Summer we’re loud singing and screaming the hallucinated acceleration of Nicotine, Valium, Vicodin, marijuana, ecstasy and alcohol in a maniacal crescendo, then Nick picks it up, but we’re back to those words Nicotine, Valium, Vicodin, marijuana, ecstasy and alcohol that if the vice squad was around would have lead to an interesting evening. The floor seems to want to give, will there be a stage invasion? Not really, but we’re closer to the stage if such thing is possible since we’re pretty much clued to it.
But before we got there we had been through the night’s moving moment, the heartfelt and out-there-hello-psychedelia rendition of Nick and us singing Auto Pilot, us kind of being the spirit of Mark Lanegan to whom Oliveri dedicated the song both used to sang on Queens of the Stone Age.
The leave, lost and broken love songs Gonna Leave You and Another Love Song, also part of the menu, retained their directness. We sang more, Nick sang more too, and loud, and loud we too were, played on fire, fast and furious. As the end approached it all got rather explosive with the cover of G.G.Allin’s Outlaw Scumfuc. Roky Ericson’s Bloody Hammer, dedicated to Ricardo, from Sonic Blast was another shot of intensity. As it was the final Nick & Mick (as in microphone) frantic incantation and incarnation of the banshees leaving everyone breathless.
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| © Raquel Pinheiro |
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| © Raquel Pinheiro |
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