So, here is my VERY VERY LONG-WINDED summary of my NIN @ Davis experience.
I had a single ticket for the NIN Davis show. I was understandably heartbroken and pissed when I couldn't get one from the online box office. So, I begged and pleaded on Craig's List, and a very kind -- but kind of creepy -- guy sold me an extra ticket he had.
On the day of the show, I had intended on leaving at 2:00 p.m. from San Francisco; the show started at 8:00. I ended up not leaving until 4, but I figured that even if it took me two hours to get there, I'd still get there two hours before the show began. God, I hate the traffic in the Bay Area. I was going so slow I could even text my best friend with my progress, and try to send an email to another friend that said, "Traffic on 80 E can suck my balls. SUCK. MY. BAAALLLLLS." I finally arrived at Davis at 6:45. I followed the directions to the parking lot, asked for directions to the Hall, and had to walk half a mile to get there. I finally got to Freeborn Hall just as the clocktower was striking 7 o'clock. The line at the door stretched all the way out to the sidewalk, down the street, and around the corner. But no sooner had I taken my place in line than the doors were open and the line began to move. Figuring in the people who arrived after I did, I was about in the middle of the pack.
When I got to the door, we all had to undergo a serious security patdown before we could go in. I guess with such a small venue and such a potentially rowdy crowd, they had to be extra careful. I had my ticket ripped, and then I walked through the door. Freeborn was indeed teeny. It made me smile just to see how close I was to the stage. There were no seats, so the standing crowd had begun to bunch up in front of the stage. I could have joined them and fought my way to the front if I had wanted to, but I was honestly a little worried because an ex had told me about his NIN concert experience at the Fragility tour show at the Cow Palace, and he said that the pit gets mean. (This was my first NIN concert, BTW.) I didn't really want to get my ass kicked, so I decided to stay out. The center of the floor was sunken, with the two sides slightly elevated with both stairs and handicapped ramps leading to the lower level. I camped out on the raised level to the right of the stage. I had a good view, I was out of the crowd, and I had a railing to lean onto and hang my purse on.
There was still some waiting around before the show started. There was this one girl who was standing next to me with her friend, making conversation with two other concert goers. This girl was gorgeous. Imagine Maggie Grace (Shannon on "Lost"), give her blunt bangs and dye her hair red-black, then dress her in supercute rocker/goth clothes and makeup. And she was wearing a shirt that I own, too. Heh. I think either her or her friend's name was Suzy. If Suzy's here -- you are really, really pretty.
Carré Callaway came on at 8. She looked to me a little like River (Summer Glau) from the now-defunct TV show "Firefly." She played her first song with a drum machine for backup, then the rest of her set with just herself and her guitar. She was... okay. She was a good guitarist. But I didn't care for her vocals at all. And while she had a good line or two, most of her lyrics were typical high schooler angst. But still, she must have had a serious set of balls to get up by herself in front of an overeager NIN crowd. And I think that she can definitely develop into a better performer, so props to her. Carré left the stage around 8:45.
The house lights came back on and the buzz in the room grew louder. Finally, we could hear the strains of the With Teeth teaser that was on NIN.com. People started cheering, then the lights went out again and everyone went completely apeshit.
In the complete dark, the first strains of "The Frail" could be heard, and slowly a soft blue spotlight came up on The Trent. There was more screaming from the crowd. But of course, this delicate, beautiful song builds and builds to "The Wretched;" the opening strains of "The Wretched" blasted out, actually drowning out the screaming crowd. The lights on the stage went up, and there was Trent in all his glory. Glory it was, too, except for his awful goddamn haircut. Still parted in the middle. For Christ's sake, Trent, you need to fix that shit.
As posted before, the show set was:
1. With Teeth teaser
2. The Frail
3. The Wretched
4. You Know What You Are
5. March of the Pigs
6. The Line Begins to Blur
7. Piggy (Trent went down into the crowd for this one. I could only tell because he suddenly disappeared, and there was screaming from the audience in the front.)
8. Terrible Lie (Trent and the band messed up this one. I'm not really sure what happened, but he didn't sing until the first chorus. That's okay; the whole audience was made up of rabid fans who sang the first verse for him.)
9. The Collector
10. Closer/The Only Time
11. Home
12. The Big Comedown (Trent prefaced this song by saying, "This is one we don't play very often..." But I love this song, so I was thrilled to hear it.)
13. The Day the World Went Away (Definitely one of my favorite NIN songs. I shrieked involuntarily when I heard the opening notes.)
14. Getting Smaller
15. With Teeth
16. Wish (Like someone said earlier, when Trent got to the line, "FIST FUCK!", about 500 arms with fists went into the air in perfect time with him. Awesome.)
17. Hurt (I damn nearly cried. Sooo beautiful. But according to you guys, some heckler down in front was shouting things like, "You ripped off Johnny Cash!" and shit. And apparently he got his ass beat, and his hair set on fire. Aw, you loyal and crazy NIN fans.)
18. The Hand That Feeds
19. Starfuckers, Inc. (The whole audience was jumping up and down like crazy)
20. Head Like a Hole
I've never had so much fun at a concert. The lighting for the stage was beautiful. There were what looked like small, thin panels of enormous LED lights behind the band, as well as blue and yellow treelike lamps that looked like they could have been from IKEA. The panels mostly had soft blue or red lighting, or a swirling mix of the two, but sometimes they blasted yellow-white light that seemed brighter than the sun. It was intense.
Trent looked awesome except for his awful, awful hair. He wore a dark green plain T-shirt and black pants; he kept pushing up the sleeves of his shirt (not sure why, but a better look at his very cut arms? Why not?) He dumped a bottle of water on himself during "The Wretched", so the shirt was all sopping and clingy, and he brushed his hair back with his hand, so even that awful hair cut was improved. He writhed as he gripped the mic stand and I just... I... Yeah. Can't think too clearly when I think about that mental image. The band (who I can never keep straight) were interesting to watch as well. The guitarist was batshit crazy. He was spinning around, swinging his guitar like he was gonna hit somebody with it, and at one point he climbed up on a stack of amps that had to be at least eight feet tall and just leapt off of it. The bassist was way more calm, but I found him interesting in watching his hands. I like seeing if I've got the notes right for the NIN songs I know on the bass myself.
Overall, what you see on the "And All That Could Have Been" DVD is what you get. That's Trent there all the way. Even the changes he made to his older songs for a live performance (extra "fucks" in the lyrics and stuff like that) were the same. But I actually don't mind that very much. I was just so glad that he sounded as good live as he does on his albums. Gawd, I would have been crushed if he'd sucked live.
Because I'd read the reviews of the other shows here on ETS, I knew that "Head Like a Hole" was the most likely last song, that the band walked off the stage around 10:30, and that there was no encore. (The set list changed pretty dramatically from the Reno and Fresno shows, but I still at least had an idea of what was coming up. That's why the sudden inclusion of "The Big Comedown" and "The Day The World Went Away" were such awesome surprises.) So, as soon as the band walked off, I rushed out of the hall while everyone stood cheering. I wanted to get one of the limited edition lithographs. I nabbed one of the last ones.
I was walking back toward the parking lot when I passed by the back of the building where the tour bus was. I figured, what the hell? Why not stay and see if I can get an autograph? So I hung out at the metal barrier security had put up and waited. I called my best friend, even though she's all the way in Australia. My phone bill's going to be crazy this month; I don't really care. After I talked to my friend I chatted with some other people hanging out. There was one nice couple who were ETS members too. (The guy was tall, with dyed-blonde-and-black hair with very well-groomed eyebrows. I didn't see too much of the girl, but she was blonde too. Hi, guys!) The back door to the Hall kept opening and closing, but it was always some security guy or roadie or something. One time this young roadie came out and handed a bottle of water to a girl who was standing in the small crowd. Everyone looked at her, trying to figure out what was going on. Then the roadie came back out, and escorted the girl into the Hall. People in the crowd started to laugh. "Okay, so she went in at 11 o'clock, so that must mean they'll be done with her and come out around... oh, eleven-thirty," I heard one guy say. Heh.
After more waiting, the door opened and we could see the head of the guitarist. The door shut again. After a few more minutes, the door opened again. This time we could see the guitarist, the bassist... and TRENT. He waved at the crowd. People cheered. The door shut again.
And then... then He finally came out. Trent started walking like he was going to go straight to the bus, but then he stopped and started signing autographs, starting with the people closest to the bus and working backward towards the door of the Hall. Most people were having him sign their tickets or dollar bills. I was in the middle of the crowd; Trent was slowly moving closer. People were shaking his hand as he moved along, guys and girls were asking him for hugs. When he got closer to me someone handed him a mink stole to sign. He looked at it and said, "What the fuck is this?" Everyone laughed. "It's a dead thing!" I said, trying to be all helpful.
Leo was standing right next to Trent. Just before Trent got to me, he said that his Sharpie was a piece of shit and that he needed a new one. Leo handed him one, cap already off. Trent laughed and joked about how great his crew was. "Right into my hand!" he said of the pen. So, I got a fresh Sharpie right on my poster.
God, Trent was less that a foot away from me. Up close, he still looked pretty good. Well built, good skin, generally healthy-looking. (And good for him, too since he's recently gotten clean and sober.) Still, that hair. Good God. And, even though my friend likes to tease me and say that Trent is a midget (don't worry, I give her a good smacking when she does), he was really only about one inch shorter than me. So that'd make him about 5'7"-5'6". Still fine by me!
I tried to think of something to say. Marry me? Have my babies? Can I smell you? But what I actually said was, "I'm really looking forward to the San Francisco and Coachella shows... should be exciting." (DORK.) "Yeah, I'm looking forward to them, too," he said. HE SPOKE TO ME! THE TRENT SPOKE TO ME! HIS EARS RECEIVED THE SOUND WAVES THAT I MADE WITH MY VOCAL CHORDS, HE PROCESSED THEM, THOUGHT OF A REPLY, AND SPOKE IT BACK TO ME! EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!
When he was done signing my poster, I said, "Thank you!" and pulled back from the barrier. Best to get out of the way and let everyone else have a turn, I figured. It was only as I started walking back to my car did I realize that um, I should have asked for a hug too. GOD DAMNIT. Anyway, as I walked back to my car I called my friend again, barely coherent, and managed to get the story out. She told me that she was so jealous she was going to crawl through my TV and kill me like in "The Ring." Heh.
The lithograph is really pretty. It's a high-quality paper, with a silkscreen print on it with black, red, and burgundy inks. Trent's black Sharpie signature is a little hard to see on the red part where he signed, but only at certain angles. At least it won't get obscured when I get it matted and framed, which my mommy is doing for me because she has all this framing/matting equipment. I'm having my concert ticket included in the frame as well.
Of course, I can't "die happy" just yet. I didn't get to touch Trent yet. But I will. Oh yes, I will.
I'm guessing it was about here that my first shoe came off in the pit. I decided I would stay in the pit even though I was only sporting one shoe. 
You might call this "not sick".
but then it got going with The Wretched. I held my ground in the center all the way through till Hurt, when I went to go join my GF. Pitty I missed the human candle, but I did hear an annoying shout right when the best purt of Hurt kicked in (last chorus). I'll assume it was him. I did see him out in the lobby with a bunch of cops when I hit the head during Starfucker's Inc.
), you know, befor he throws them off the stage? I think Aaron's going to be going DOWN after a few more concerts! 
, and the kid's brothers was Neil Diamond (he got me beat). I told the kid having NIN as his first concert was definitely going to score him cool points with the chicks. At least more so than his brother's Neil Diamond! 