May 6, 2009 – Having laid waste to arenas, amphitheaters, and festivals grounds all over the world, Slipknot brought the All Hope Is Gone World Tour to the Scottrade Center in downtown St. Louis in a fierce, pummeling set that delivered the band's signature sound to a legion of fans. 
Photographer's Notes:
After photographing Slipknot on the Mayhem Fest 2008, I was excited to shoot them again when I heard that they were extending their touring schedule into 2009. Just as with their headlining Mayhem fest performance, the band delivered an all out assault on stage under dramatic lighting.
Overall, the lighting on frontman Corey Taylor for this show was a little cleaner, with bright white treatments at multiple points during the first three songs. Lighting on the rest of the stage was much more atmospheric, with reds and blues dominating the sides of the stage.
For the stage setup, three ego risers were positioned at the front of the stage with large wedges in between and in front of them. While Corey Taylor made good use out of these, they seemed to go completely unused for the rest of the band, and served only to block the other players. This arrangement was different from Mayhem, for which only Corey had a riser.
I shot this set with my three standard zooms: the Nikon 14-24mm, Nikon 24-70mm, and Nikon 70-200mm. The latter was only brought out during the third song for a few different shots of Corey to mix things up.
At about five-feet, the stage was just high enough that the ultra-wide 14-24mm wasn't as useful as it might have been with a lower stage (considering the ego risers). If pressed, 24mm on the midrange zoom would have been quite good for most of the shooting.
End Notes:
You can see the set from Mayhem Fest 2008 here to compare with the band's 2009 tour.
