Most concerts are polished packages—tight setlists, clean transitions, a bow on top. SESSANTA V2.0 in Philly? That was a three-band acid test wrapped in birthday candles and lit on fire by a trio of musical alchemists. Last night at The Mann, Maynard James Keenan didn’t just celebrate turning 61 — he threw a hallucinatory dinner party where the main course was chaos, the dessert was nostalgia, and the waiters were members of Primus, A Perfect Circle, and Puscifer, passing instruments like hors d’oeuvres.
SESSANTA isn’t a show in the traditional sense. It’s a living mixtape. A deranged, genreless time loop where one minute you’re watching Les Claypool bend space-time with his bass, and the next you’re buried under a soaring A Perfect Circle chorus before being whipped into a Puscifer fever dream. The format was fluid. No openers. No encores. Just an ever-shifting stage of rotating players and shifting vibes, like a jukebox possessed by three ghosts of alternative rock.
Claypool was, unsurprisingly, the spiritual prankster of the evening. His basslines strutted, slapped, and sneered with every note. Billy Howerdel brought the heart — his shimmering riffs and haunted tones grounding the madness like a lighthouse in a storm. And then there’s Maynard — the eye of this beautifully swirling storm. Equal parts shaman, circus ringleader, and dad who refuses to age conventionally, he floated in and out of the spotlight like a man who’s spent decades making weird feel holy.
The night unfolded like a fever dream you wanted to stay inside. A Perfect Circle opened with “The Package,” hypnotizing the room, before handing the reins to Primus for a set that was pure sludge-funk sorcery. Puscifer’s turns were theatrical, moody, and spacey as hell — “The Algorithm” and “Bullet Train to Iowa” felt like transmissions from another planet. And then they’d all collide again, an exquisite pileup of moods and motifs.
No two songs felt the same, and yet they fit together like jagged puzzle pieces. “The Noose” unfolded like a solemn ceremony, drawing the crowd into a hushed, reverent trance. “Southbound Pachyderm,” with all three drummers hammering the floor like ritual percussionists, felt like the Earth was shifting underfoot. And through it all, you got the sense this wasn’t just a jam session — it was a message: music doesn’t expire, and neither does defiance.
This wasn’t a birthday party. It was a rebellion wrapped in reverb. A weird, unfiltered, soul-shaking communion of sound and strangeness. Keenan didn’t just turn 61 — he made 60 look like a launchpad.
SESSANTA V2.0 wasn’t a show you watched. It was a strange religion you joined for one night. And in Philly, we converted in droves.
