Jason Newsted is a Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inductee and former member of the biggest metal band in the world, Metallica. Newsted has cycled through various projects since leaving Metallica and has been off the road for more than a decade. With The Chophouse Band in tow, Jason Newsted made a triumphant return to touring with an incredible set made up of covers and a few originals as the band kicked off its first tour ever at the iconic Iron Horse in Northampton, MA.
Please scroll below for the MisplacedStraws Jason Newsted live photos and review –
The night began with a nod to the past, a cover from The Carter Family, the first family of country music. The Chophouse Band, featuring Jason Newsted, Humberto Perez, and Jessie Farnsworth on guitar, Jimbo Hart on bass, and Robert John Tucker on drums, added their own spin to the track. It was heavy, swampy, but kept the sense of melody, traits that would define the evening. Newsted told the crowd early that this set was about heroes, and as the night went on, he talked about the artists he covered and their influence on his music. It’s always interesting to hear someone who has played on huge records talk about the music outside of their particular genre that influenced them. This was not a metal show, it bordered on Americana but with heavier guitars, and the occasional growl.
Jason Newsted may be the draw, but the Chophouse Band is made up of some seriously brilliant musicians. Most of the band have played with Newsted for a number of years, with Farnsworth going back to the metal band Newsted. The addition of Hart on bass, a founding member of Jason Isbell & The 400 Unit, is, in my opinion, what helps transform the sound and brings in more of the Americana flavor. The combination of Perez’s soulful solos with the edge of Farnsworth and Tucker’s playing turns this band into something totally unique. Newsted did some vocals in Metallica and his other projects, but this outlet lets him showcase his voice in a whole new way. Aside from the original songs, covers like Levon Helm’s “Hurricane”, let the crowd hear how talented a vocalist he is.
The “Evening With” was split into 2 sets, each roughly 80+ minutes with a short break. The second set saw Newsted on bass for a track as well as acoustic guitar. The interesting cover choices continued with a blistering version of the Joan Baez-cum-Judas Priest classic “Diamonds and Rust” and perhaps the most inspired choice of the night, “Massachusetts Afternoon” by The Blue Jean Committee (Google it to get the joke). As great as the covers were, the original music stole the show. This band needs to release music now. Lyrically, the songs are reminiscent of the heroes he mentions, like John Prine and Joan Baez, but also more modern influences like Jason Isbell. Newsted and his band are combining all of these influences to create something entirely new that deserves to be heard by more than those who take the chance to come to a show.
Those hoping for a cover or two from Newsted’s old band may have been disappointed. He did throw in a quick riff from “Blackened” when talking about songwriting, and the band covered a song Metallica recorded and covered themselves, Bob Segar’s “Turn The Page”. The biggest nod came at the end of the original song “War Prayer”, based on the Mark Twain poem of the same name. As the song built to a crescendo, a familiar riff rose to the surface, with the chant “Die…Die…Die”. The crowd erupted for a few moments of the classic “Creeping Death”.
Jason Newsted spent much of the night talking about heroes. To many in the capacity crowd, he is certainly one. That is a burden he seems to take seriously. It was easy to see how much this night meant to him, and that the audience showed up with no familiarity of the music, just there because he was. He got choked up at the end trying to let people know how lucky we all are to be able to enjoy the music we love without censorship as it is not that way in many of the countries he’s played in. I write a lot about how music can bring back memories once forgotten. Watching Jason on stage, you can see the 25-year-old kid who played massive stages with Metallica as the Statue of Liberty crumbled around him during “…And Justice For All”, and it makes me remember the 15-year-old that was amazed watching it. Musicians are like friends, they arrive at that perfect time in your life, then sometimes you can go years without seeing them, but when you meet up in a bar in Northampton, MA, you pick up where you left off, and to quote one of the great original songs played, you’re “fucking glad to be alive”.
