STONE TEMPLE PILOTS LIVE!! | REDHAT
STP (Stone Temple Pilots) performed at the Redhat Amphitheater in Raleigh to a packed venue of dedicated fans. The band performed with new lead singer Jeff Gutt who has taken over frontman duties after the tragic death of Scott Weiland in 2015 due to a drug overdose. The band is best known for their major hits in the 90’s including, “Plush”, “Big Empty”, “Creep”, Interstate Love Song”, “Vaseline”, “Sour Girl” and many others. These hits were all sung by their legendary original frontman Scott Weiland.
The band is back on tour with new lead singer Jeff Gutt and performed all of their biggest hits and Jeff did a great job on vocals. He sounded a lot like Scott when performing but was not Scott in the end. The band as a whole sounded great with original members, Robert DeLeo (Bass), Eric Kretz (Drums) and Dean DeLeo (Lead Guitar) still performing and bring some of the original band’s sound to the stage. I do have to say it was strange seeing someone else performing in Scott’s place on vocals. I also found it was odd seeing Jeff Gutt try to emulate not only Scotts singing style but also his look. If you were to have glanced up at the stage without carefully looking you would have mistakenly thought Scott was up on stage singing, they looked so similar from a distance. Either way, it was a strange thing to see but after adjusting my brain a little bit I really did enjoy each song performed. It was great seeing the founding members on stage performing though their performance was lacking any luster and was boring. The band as whole seemed very bored and not very into the show. Eric Kretz (Drummer) was just going through the motions and looked like he was waiting for the show to be over. Bassist Robert DeLeo barely moved and stayed in one spot showing no enthusiasm at all while lead guitarist Dean DeLeo did move around slightly but also seemed bored while performing. Oddly enough the only member of the band that seemed energized and excited to be there was the only non-original member of the group and that was Jeff Gutt. Jeff was great to see perform as he moved around the stage, engaged with the fans and seemed to embrace the moment.
I know for a lot of fans it is hard to imagine STP performing without Scott, but other bands have done this in the past including the band, Journey. The one thing fans going to see STP live have to keep in mind, is that you are going to experience and hear the songs you loved growing up or that impacted your life and have a good time. STP did sound great as whole and it was nice to hear some classic songs performed from their catalog but in the end the band seemed bored, tired and just going through the motions for a paycheck. The only one out of the group that seemed excited to be there was Jeff Gutt and I give him credit for that, I can’t imagine the undertaking it is to follow in the footsteps of Scott Weiland, who is arguably one of the best lead vocalists in the history of rock and roll music. Jeff was the only one who really made the show bearable to watch and I appreciated his performance.
Update:
There are no photographs of lead guitarist Dean DeLeo as he requested them not to be shared but he was there performing.
