It was amazing to see Faith No More back in Europe again after last year’s summer off and the Usce Park in Belgrade and the Belgrade Calling provided a somewhat bizarre setting for the second date of their European tour.
Truncated set
I know some people have commented on the shortened setlist so I’ll attempt a simple explanation. Despite the first act being billed to start at 1745 local time, the somewhat heavy-handed security did not even allow people into the venue until 1815 and it soon became obvious that Ugly Kid Joe would now be starting their set any time soon and roadies and techs endeavoured to sort out a sound problem on stage (by the way why are all roadies everywhere always English?). So the running order for the fest was about 90 minutes behind all day and all bands – possibly with the exception of PIL – played truncated sets. Faith No More did not even take to the stage until 0045 and then there were some immediate sound problems. Factor in the fact that they were booked on a four-and-half-hour charter flight to Perm for 3am, then the short set makes sense. There were no more songs listed on the printed setlist by the way.
Sound issues
After that delayed start I actually thought that the sound from the main stage at the festival was excellent and agreeably louder than at most festivals – perhaps due to Serbia being free from EU decibel controls. But the FNM set was dogged by mic (not Mike) issues from the start, with sound techs scrambling round to fix cables and tame the savage beast that eventually resulted in Mike P striking out at a hapless tech.

Belgrade calls
I only had a brief time in the Serbia capital but I’d highly recommend Belgrade for a visit. I get the feeling that this is the time to visit as gentrification and a tourist takeover is about 5-10 years away. But now the city remains raw and real. And hot, very, very hot. It was over 35 degrees each day I was there. As for the festival, it was small and boutique and generally very enjoyable. But it was quite obvious that this was the first year of the fest. Information was scarce, food stalls amounted to one chip fryer and a popcorn stand (there was, however, no shortage of beer tents). Band-wise, Ugly Kid Joe looked game on their comeback and singer Whitfield Crane could not contain his admiration for Faith No More either during his performance or when watching from the side of the stage. The Horrors’ new shoe-gazing could have been out of place on a summer festival stage but they delivered and Roddy Bottum was a keen observer from the side of the stage. PIL were better live than on record with Johnny RottenLydon at his snarling best (I found that both The Horrors and PIL each have a little bit of FNM DNA in there somewhere), while The Darkness are back to their 2003 vintage complete with catsuits and caterwauling.
Tribute time
A little bit of an oddity this. If you are in a Faith No More tribute band, what do you do on the night Faith No More play in your city? Well, for Face to Face the sensible idea seemed to be to play a rival gig. Their posters were even cheek by jowl with FNM posters across the city:
Mike watch
Apart from his techie contretemps, Mike also found time to pay a tongue-in-cheek Digging the Grave tribute to new Serbian president Tomislav Nikolić. This was largely met with a chorus of boos from the audience. Lazar explains the reference in Comments: “Digging the Grave was dedicated to Serbia’s newly elected president, followed by somewhat of a boo from the crowd. I guess it was just Patton being Patton, not really meant seriously or without any political agenda. The new guy we just got… Well I think it’s safe to pronounce him conservative, so he would probably not be the choice of a typical Serbian FNM fan, to put it that way…One more thing about Digging the Grave being dedicate to the new president. It actually makes sense, if you know the inside joke (and somebody must’ve told it to the guys): before becoming politically active, our new president used to be a superintendant (a manager of some sort) of a cemetery in a town in central Serbia). Because of this his nickname for years has been “grobar”, meaning undertaker or gravedigger. So there you have it – gravedigger, Digging the grave…”
Mike also did his usual taking over the TV camera bit during Just a Man.
Photo via the lovely Nina Ackerman
New merch
As you can see from the pic of me up above, Faith No More had some new merchandise on sale at the festival. I picked up the white “Afterlife” tee and a nifty (though possibly more for girls) black t-shirt with red print while there was also another black tee with front and back prints and a black hoodie.
Pic via faithnomoreblog on Facebook
New song
The new song was played again in Belgrade and I’ll eventually get my video of it plus some more info later today.
Media view
Mike and the techie got quite a bit of media coverage
Leading tabloid Blic on techie
Blic on Digging the Grave
TV and radio station and general media behemoth B92 reported that: “The greatest excitement was caused when Patton as an encore in Serbian sang “Come on, Jano,” much better than at the Novi Sad festival “EXIT” in 2010. Although the concert was delayed for over an hour because of the whole program, but the scenery and set demanding, patient audience was rewarded with an excellent concert by the famous band.”
Meanwhile, 24 Sata reckoned FNM were worth the wait.
Very unprofessional don’t get me wrong Mike is amazing at what he does. I understand why he was not happy with the mistakes etc. I would be mad but hitting someone and getting hold of the guys face and pushing him backstage is a bit much. Lovage anger management comes to mind
Another video of the new song @ Belgrade with slightly less distortion:
If anyone here is on dime a dozen…the Moscow show is already up! Audience recording. There is a sample included and it sounds pretty clear.
@benrun. Thanks!!
Moscow vids are up…they played Spirit again! Everything else looks pretty familiar, Helpless again too.
In his younger days…Bill was quite hard on screw ups as well! I recall reading about him punching Chuck in the stomach just off stage in The Real Story. I already wrote on this, but I think it’s correct to say Patton is somewhat of a different person on stage, but it still doesn’t make it right. As far as being critical of his bandmates…I’m somewhat fine with it for bands like Fantomas where they are really HIS band, but I hope he doesn’t take that conductor mentality into FNM or Tomahawk, which are more true bands. I think mostly we are mistaken and he’s just fueling the engine of the band, keeping them going, etc. But after the 2nd LA show, when he was crowdsurfing during Pristina (last song), some of those assholes were grabbing his nuts and he was hitting them with the mic and kicking them. Then he got on stage and was trying to scream something into the mic but it failed and he smashed it on the stage and walked off cursing and raging…I’ve always wondered what he was saying to the crowd if that mic was working…we could have seen a whole different side!
As for Patton, I love the guy but that was pretty dickish on his part.
That was a great read Admin, thanks!
I will say this….i go out on stage to try and sort out some technical glitch and then get smacked for it….watch the fuck out asshole…cause i would smack you right back. Dont get me wrong, i love mike patton and fnm but nobody deserves to be humiliated….i find mike can be a real dick. I really dont like thinking this about a guy who i admire tremendously…… Everyone deserves respect…regardless of their shortcomings.
Daniel ~ Haha, I forgot to add that 🙂 And I hope they play Ricochet again 😉
Firsa, its always funny until someone gets hurt and then its just hilarious!
I’d venture to say Patton really isn’t himself when he’s on stage. Maybe its nerves or something. And everyone who knows him (i.e. the band) knows it and can shrug it off pretty easily. I hope.
But nobody deserves to be hit… I’m not sure if that was him truly losing his cool or entirely intentional, like some oddly contrived character acting…
I don’t really like the persona I’ve formed of Mike from what little I know of him; so if he wants to present himself as despicable that’s nothing new and fine with me, so long as it doesn’t interfere with FNM’s high performance standard – and nobody gets hurt.
He wouldn’t be doing these shows if he didn’t want to.
Patton has always been extremely hard on fellow band members about anything he deems as a mistake in some way. Himself not so much…
Awesome Adrian thanks for sharing and great to have you back 🙂
There were quite a few times during these reunion shows that Patton got pissed off at something, whether it was a technical problem, a roadie, a fan or the setlist (at the SWU gig in Sao Paulo you can hear someone asking at the end of Gentle Art of Making Enemies – “King or Spirit?” and Patton replies “King, King, fuck Spirit”). I wouldn’t go as far as saying that he’s doesn’t enjoy doing these shows (there were several moments in which he seemed to be having fun – stage dives, diving on Puffy etc.), but maybe he would rather be doing something else or he’s just becoming a grumpy singer.
Am I the only one who thinks Patton looks like he’s put on a few pounds? Not that I care- But isn’t it so? And why is he getting pissed of when Roddy’s playing the piano-section in the first verse of the new song?
It seems to me like Roddy isn’t half as much of a perfectionist as Patton, so maybe he improvised a little? And Patton didn’t approve?
Many questions! I guess only Patton can answer this….. And I’m a little bit drunk… Bye!
(^pretty distorted once the drums/bass kick in)
Video of new song being performed in Belgrade:
http://youtu.be/79QCftGi6Kk
I know Patton sometimes gets mad at the sound techs but damn, it looks like he was ready to fight that guy. Was the sound really that bad or was something else going on I wonder?
Great post, admin, thank you.
The new merch is on the FNM web site.
Admin…..can you post a little more about the new merch…i.e. what did each look like (hard to tell from pick)…..
Thanks for the post, sounds like a great time. Some great info in there about the Serbian president. Are you going to make it to any of the other shows on the tour?
Funny to hear about Ugly Kid Joe… part of the reason why I got into Faith No More that late (frankly, embarrassingly late, with King for a Day.. I was already nineteen) was because I had the wrong impression of the band. I was more into Anthrax, Helloween and “real metal” bands, and thought FNM were more of a commercial sounding metal band… sort of like Ugly Kid Joe which, to this day, I don’t think I’ve ever really heard. I probably just mixed up their names altogether.
Anyway, I’m heading for Poland tomorrow from Stockholm and look forward to that show… and Rock For People the day after! I’m counting on a couple surprises.
Great post Admin, thanks a lot! Did you get to meet the band backstage? Give us some insider info on whatever it is you found out about the Afterlife and so on.