Mando Saenz titled his first album in eight years All My Shame. But the veteran Nashville songwriter who’s had his songs recorded by Miranda Lambert, Midland, and Lee Ann Womack has nothing to regret. Despite the heaviness of the record’s title, Saenz isn’t repenting for past sins. Instead, he’s celebrating the empowerment that comes with finally knowing oneself.
“You might think it’s a shameful thing, but it’s about being yourself and knowing your flaws,” Saenz says. “Sometimes you just got to put it out there and not consider them flaws — it’s just who you are.”
Saenz, a native of Corpus Christi, Texas, cut his teeth in the Houston clubs before moving to Nashville. For All My Shame, he worked with producer Ken Coomer (Wilco), who helped him tap into dream-pop sounds and vibes on the album. There are elements of both Big Star and Radiohead in tracks like “In All My Shame” and “Talk Is Cheap.”
“I knew I had those influences just because I loved all different kinds of music over the years, including those two bands, but I didn’t realize how much infused into my writing until Ken’s production brought it out,” Saenz says. “It was good to let these songs breathe in that direction.”
While he has a hand in writing radio hits for Music Row, Saenz identifies more with Nashville’s potent indie scene. In his words, he’s a loner. “I’ve always been kind of an oddball,” he says. “When it comes to the industry part, I’ve kind of consciously put blinders on. I really don’t want to know what goes on behind the curtain. I don’t even listen to a lot of country radio.”
It’s surprising then to hear him describe All My Shame as “the most Nashville record I’ve ever made.”
“I say that because they’re mostly co-writes on this record. I’ve always written for myself, even if the song happens to get cut [by someone else]. But this was all written pretty much on Music Row with a lot of writers I’d never even met before,” he says. “But we were just trying to write songs; we’re not really chasing tails.”
But Saenz did chase, and successfully catch, something from his childhood for the album. At Coomer’s suggestion, he recorded a cover of “Rainbow in the Dark,” by Dio — Saenz’s first concert experience as a kid.
On paper, a Texas-born quasi-country singer covering a 1983 heavy-metal standard reads like a trainwreck. But by stripping down the song to just a guitar and Saenz’s haunting voice, “Rainbow in the Dark” emerges as a devastating folk ballad. Saenz has described his version as one in line with a Townes Van Zandt performance.
“It was pretty much kismet because that was my first concert ever. I was in the fifth grade,” Saenz says of cutting “Rainbow in the Dark.” “I just knew that that’s a song I had to make special — I have too many metal friends.”
He needn’t have worried. Even the late Ronnie James Dio would have given Saenz’s cover the metal-horns salute. “I was happy to see a lot of people I really trusted [liked it],” he says. “That was a big relief.”
NEWS
Placebo have kicked off their 30th anniversary tour by dusting off some tracks for the first time in over 20 years, and also playing new single ‘Helen Keller’ live for the first time.
The new dates come as the band are celebrating the 30 years since they dropped their 1996 debut album. To mark the occasion, they have announced a huge UK and European arena tour, where they have vowed to predominantly play material from their first album and their sophomore record ‘Without You I’m Nothing’.
At the opening night at Krakatoa in Mérignac, France, Brian Molko and co. delivered a stacked 19-song set, which began with ‘Pure Morning’, and immediately went into the first rendition of ‘Come Home’ in 20 years.
Another rarity came straight after, with the first live performance of ‘You Don’t Care About Us’ since 2001, as well as ‘Without You I’m Nothing’ and ‘Allergic (To Thoughts Of Mother Earth)’ which were played for the first time since 2018 and 2014 respectively.
‘Drowning by Numbers’, ‘Bruise Pristine’ and ‘My Sweet Prince’ were all introduced into the setlist for the first time since 2001, ‘Brick Shithouse’ was aired out for the first time since 2003, ‘Scared Of Girls’ was played for the first time since 2010, and both ‘Lady Of The Flowers’ and ‘36 Degrees’ were broken out for the first time in nine years.
The rest of the set was made up of ‘Teenage Angst’, ‘Bionic’, ‘I Know’ and ‘Every You Every Me’, and the band wrapped up the performance with two covers: Depeche Mode’s ‘I Feel You’, and Kate Bush’s ‘Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God)’.
It wasn’t until a later show at the Super Bock Arena in Porto, Portugal, that Placebo broke out their new song ‘Helen Keller’ for the first time – playing it 13 songs into the setlist.
Check out more footage from the tour so far below, as well as the setlist from night one.
‘Pure Morning’
‘Come Home’ (First time since 2006)
‘You Don’t Care About Us'(First Time Since 2001)
‘Teenage Angst’
‘Bionic’
‘Without You I’m Nothing” (First Time Since 2018)
‘Allergic (to Thoughts of Mother Earth)” (First Time Since 2014)
‘Drowning by Numbers” (First Time Since 2001)
’36 Degrees” (Alternate Version – First Time Since 2017)
‘I Know’
‘Brick Shithouse’ (First Time Since 2003)
‘Scared of Girls’ (First Time Since 2010)
‘Bruise Pristine” (First Time Since 2001)
‘My Sweet Prince’ (First Time Since 2001)
‘Lady of the Flowers’ (First time since 2017)
‘Nancy Boy’
‘Every You Every Me’
‘I Feel You’ (Depeche Mode cover, live debut)
‘Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God)’ (Kate Bush cover)
Placebo dropped the single ‘Helen Keller’ on September 28, and it sees them reach back to ‘H.K. Farewell’, a hidden instrumental from the era of their self-titled 1996 debut. In the track, they retain the eerie keyboard melody from the original, and push it to new dimensions with a heavier, more anguished feeling.
The title refers to the American author, who was also a disability rights advocate and political activist, who became deafblind as a young child and went on to become an internationally renowned writer and campaigner.
As well as the tour, Placebo also celebrated the 30th anniversary of their debut by releasing a reimagined version of the record. For the LP, Molko and Stefan Olsdal returned to the original master tapes and reworked all 10 songs from the 1996 record – describing it as a “director’s cut” that helped them inject the original songs with three decades more experience.
The ongoing tour will reach the UK and Ireland in late November and early December, where they will play Nottingham, Glasgow, Dublin, Manchester, London and Cardiff. See all the dates here and find any remaining tickets here.
Dates will head to Latin America in 2027, beginning in São Paulo on February 20 and running through Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Peru and Colombia before wrapping up with shows in Guadalajara and Monterrey in March.
Placebo dropped their last album of new material in 2022, with ‘Never Let Me Go’. That record was given a four-star review by NME, which described it as “a renaissance rock record with an experimental edge”, adding that it found Placebo “inspired and ready for a new era”.
