NOW Newspaper
Concert Reviews

Crazy Love


At midnight, there was still no sign of Hole's fearless leader, Courtney Love.

It seemed like hours since Montreal's woman-powered Bite trio had tried to pacify the sullen young horde with some coyly inept basement-rock bashing.  Once the off-key screeching stopped, the teenaged assembly sat themselves back down on the floor, camp-style, patiently awaiting the arrival of the Love Experience.  As an annoyingly eager roving MTV video jock quickly discovered, there were as many people present out of a morbid fascination with the shattered widow of a dead icon Kurt Cobain as out of a desire to participate in the last all-night bash of the summer.

Having missed 2 flights from Seattle, the boisterous blond finally teetered onstage at 12:35, laid a big sloppy kiss on bassist Melissa Auf der Maur (formerly of Montreal's Tinker), strapped on her axe and defiantly began to slash and scream. 

Love made no attempt to hide her pain.  There was an unfathomably deep hurt in the way she growled, "I am the one that should have died" as an intro to the haunting Miss World.  Yet she refused to accept anyone's pity, hurling forth one scorching rant after the next.

Even if Love hadn't a clue where she was - "Is this Vancouver?" she babbled halfway through the set.  "I used to strip at a club here" - she intuitively maintained a firm grip on the proceedings.  "I'm not a feminist!" she announced, hocking a massive loogie before barrelling into Pretty On The Inside and a ferocious Teenage Whore. 

Pausing for a breather, Love noticed the odd stagefront gathering of Cobain clones outfitted in light blue cardigans, white T-shirts and carefully torn jeans and muttered, "Glad you could all make it to the freak show."  She then further taunted the thrill-seekers by offering to take off her top for $20.  There were no takers.  Evidently the pre-teens in sniffer's row had blown their concert allowance on T-shirts and pop. 

While parents paced nervously outside the club, Love treated the hangers to a loopy encore romp through Duran Duran's peeler fave Hungry Like The Wolf before ripping into riot-grrrl throwdown Rock Star.  Then before guitarist Eric Erlandson could sneak offstage with the rest of the band, she demanded he play "the blues song" as a closer. 

A tenuous Erlandson fumbled through the changes of a tune he'd never played live as the singer grabbed the microphone with both hands, hunched over and belted out Leadbelly's Where Did You Sleep Last Night?  It was a ramshackle but chillingly potent homage to Cobain, and it left no doubts that it will take more than drugs, alcohol and even death to stop Courtney Love. 



--Tim Perlich