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DISTURBED, BREAKING BENJAMIN, JINJER In Houston, TX With Photos!

By Larry Petro, News Monkey
Saturday, July 29, 2023 @ 8:07 PM

The Take Back Your Life Tour Literally Fires Things Up At The Woodlands Pavilion July 27th

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All Photos By Larry Petro/Petrofyed Photography

Only in Texas. I've seen a lot of different things during my lifetime of attending concerts but the Take Back Your Life Tour featuring nu-metal legends DISTURBED, with BREAKING BENJAMIN and JINJER in support was one for the annals of history, not only for this reviewer but also for DISTURBED it would seem. And as the temperatures once again soared to over 100 degrees on this late July evening, things were about to get much hotter, both literally and figuratively.

Ukrainian metallers JINJER took the stage and after having cancelled their last scheduled trek across the States to stand in solidarity with their home country in its war against Russia they are making the most of this support slot. Kicking their 6 song set with "Perennial" from their Macro EP, vocalist Tatiana Shmayluk got the crowd fired up with her mix of clean vocals and cookie monster growls. The band performed 4 tracks from their recent album Wallflowers i "Call Me A Symbol", "Copycat", "Vortex" and set closer "As I Boil Ice". Tatiana is a joy to watch as she works the crowd and I was impressed with my first time having seen them perform.

Setlist:

"Perennial"

"Call Me A Symbol"

"Vortex"

"I Speak Astronomy"

"Copycat"

"As I Boil Ice"

Next up was what seems like one of the original "buzz" bands, BREAKING BENJAMIN. I say that because this band has probably played Houston more times than any other over the past decade, having played at several Buzzfest events over that time. It's a wonder that in all that time I have yet to catch them live, that is until now, probably because I'm not a huge fan of the 'buzz' bands or 'alternative' music or whatever the Gen-Xers are calling it these days. Fronted by the only constant member of the band, vocalist Benjamin Burnley, they are fan favorites here in Houston and from the moment they took the stage there was no doubt of that, starting things with "Failure" from the band's 2015 album Dark Before Dawn, followed by a pair from Phobia (2006) in "Breath" and "Until The End". The crowd was in full sing-along mode as the BREAKING BENJAMIN rolled through a nice selection of their catalog that included "Polyamorous", "Blow Me Away" and "Sooner Or Later" before ending the set with a triple shot of 3 of their biggest hits, "So Cold", "I Will Not Bow" and "The Diary Of Jane", with only "Dance With The Devil" squeezed in between them. During all of those numbers Benjamin could have just stayed silent and the crowd would have sung every word. It was a great 'homecoming' of sorts for these guys and I was glad to finally see what everyone else has seen all these years.

Setlist:

"Failure"
"Breath"
"Until The End"
"Red Cold River"
"Polyamorous"
"Blow Me Away"
"Simple Design"
"Follow"
"Sooner Or Later"
"So Cold"
"Dance With The Devil"
"I Will Not Bow"
"The Diary of Jane"

Now the set by DISTURBED can be described with one word: Fire. Lots of fire. The stage initially looked very unassuming after the curtain dropped and the band unleashed the fury with "Hey You", the first single from their most recent album Divisive. What appeared to be just three rows of lighting turned out to be much more than that, with each bar not only segmented so that each piece could be moved and adjusted but the entire length of each bar was fitted with apparatuses that emitted flames and boy did they put those to the test. After the opener they went all the way back to the first album with "Stupify" from 2000's The Sickness and then "Ten Thousand Fists". Of the 17 songs they performed I can only think of one that didn't include flames of some sort, that being "A Reason To Fight". DISTURBED brutally assaulted our senses throughout the night in the form of

"Prayer", "Bad Man", "Indestructible" and the GENESIS cover "Land Of Confusion", a version they absolutely rock the shit out of, and a personal favorite from the Guitar Hero series, "Stricken". Check out some videos on YouTube of some of these numbers to see what I mean about the lighting trusses and the fire. Even the mellow cover of SIMON & GARFUNKEL's "The Sound Of Silence" had fire, including on top of the piano Dan Donegan was playing. The band themselves were 'on fire' with all the fervor and energy of a band that's in its prime and the enjoyment they were experiencing onstage definitely translated to the crowd who ate it up.

Following a brief intermission the band returned once again and became "Unstoppable", which is the second time in recent months that I have seen a band do a song from their newest album as an encore, the other being GODSMACK and the song "Surrender". I had no problem with that as I think DISTURB's latest album is excellent. From there they rolled right into the one song everyone in what was probably sold out, or very close to it, crowd had waited for, "Down With The Sickness". The place was going bonkers and was reaching a fever pitch, with the band showing the entire night why they are still at the top of their game.

Now here's where things got weird. DISTURBED had used a shit ton of fire during their set and by the time they launched into their final encore, ironically being "Inside The Fire", the pyrotechnic knobs were turned up to 11 and the flames got just that much higher during this closing number. Well, evidently the venue's fire suppression system had finally had enough and threw in the towel, unleashing the full torrent of the sprinkler system down on the band, stage, their gear and even their tour photographer. Those in attendance initially thought this was all part of the show but once they discovered the surprised looks on the band's faces, particularly frontman David Draiman, they knew that this was certainly not the case. In a post the following day, guitarist Dan Donegan revealed that this was a first for the band in their entire career and that it ruined his in-ear monitors, his mic and probably some other gear as well.

What a rock show this was! Things really are done bigger in Texas. The tour, with BREAKING BENJAMIN and JINJER performing on most dates, continues through September 2nd so don't miss this show if it comes to your town, it is literally one of the hottest acts this summer.