In August 2025, Canadian musician grandson, stage name of Jordan Edward Benjamin, announced that he would be taking the ‘INERTIA Tour’ to Europe. He sold out his show in Utrecht, The Netherlands, so fast that a second date was added. On February 2nd, grandson played that second show in TivoliVredenburg to a room that was maybe not sold out, but still pretty packed.
About an hour after doors opened, support act Pinkshift took to the stage to warm up the crowd. The Baltimore, Maryland-based band consists of lead singer Ashrita Kumar, guitarist Paul Vallejo, and drummer Myron Houngbedji. On stage, they were joined by their touring bassist Kirby Bell and guitarist Michael Stabekis. As the band dove right into ‘Evil Eye’, it became immediately clear that for the next half hour, the room would be filled with dirty vocals, raw guitar riffs, and sweaty mosh pits. “We like to get rowdy,” Kumar said in between songs ‘Anita Ride’ and ‘AUTHORITY PROBLEM’. Before performing the latter, Kumar said that “I can tell y’all one thing about me, I got a problem with authority”. They don’t like it when people tell them what to do, which is evident from how the band goes against the grain. In between the heavy performances, Kumar took several moments to speak out against the violation of human rights that’s apparent in many parts of the world. For example, before performing ‘BURN THE WITCH’, they said how in the USA, ICE is currently “kidnapping our neighbours [and] murdering our friends” and is “after people like me”. This led to angry cries from the audience, who wholeheartedly agreed with everything Kumar said.
During the sixth song on tonight’s support setlist, ‘Blood’, Kumar motioned for the crowd to split right down the middle so a wall of death could take place. Everyone enthusiastically obliged. Finally, Pinkshift ended the night with ‘Love It Here’ and ‘the kids aren’t alright’. Of course, they took a moment in between to thank grandson for granting them the opportunity to go on tour with him. Kumar also took one final moment to chant that “trans rights are human rights” and “free Palestine”. “We take that rage, and we turn it into power,” he said before teaching the crowd the lyrics to that last song on the setlist. As the band left the stage, they gave some attention to the fans who had given them all their energy tonight, with Kumar fistbumping some people right at the front of the crowd.
A few minutes before the clock would strike 9, Rage Against the Machine’s ‘Killing in the Name Of’ began playing over the speakers – which is how grandson’s fans knew it’d soon be time for the show to start. As a spoken interlude played over the speakers following that song, grandson’s band walked on stage, consisting of guitarist Amin Mortada, bassist Maxwell Urasky, and drummer Miles Elze. As soon as grandson himself came on, wearing dark pants and a dark jacket, he began the show with ‘AUTONOMOUS DELIVERY ROBOT’, an anthem that criticizes today’s technology and marketing tactics. And so, the tone was set – this would be one and a half hours of raging against the system. Banger after banger was played with grandson barely taking a moment to breathe, encouraging the audience to crowdsurf and mosh as much as they wanted. For the fifth song played, ‘BELLS OF WAR’, the singer made it down into the pit himself. As soon as he climbed back on, he took off his jacket to reveal a white t-shirt and the tattoo sleeves on his arms. “It feels good to express ourselves like this,” he said, speaking to the audience without his mic, forcing everyone to listen to what he had to say. “The community around you that feels the same empathy that you do, that needs to express this anger for the state of the world, […] it’s bigger than you realize,” he continued, which led to loud cheers. He finished his speech by saying that the whole room is a safe space for everyone tonight, no matter your sexuality or heritage, and that after tonight, you will be “bigger, stronger, and angrier than you were before”.
He asked the audience to put their fists up to the sky before he performed ‘Stigmata’. Mixing some older songs like that one with songs from his latest record, INERTIA, the singer made sure that everyone in the audience got what they came for. While the moshing never stopped, it grew even bigger when grandson asked the crowd to “open it up” during ‘Overdose’. During the next song, ‘6:00’, Mortada and Urasky went down into the moshpit themselves, with grandson telling the crowd to form a circle pit around them. When they made it back on stage, grandson and his band continued with ‘LITTLE WHITE LIES’ before the singer made time for his second speech of the night. While this one was a bit harder to hear because of Elze’s drumming, the cheers from the audience made it clear that they agreed with everything the singer said about fascist regimes. At the end of his speech, he motioned for the crowd to put their middle fingers up for the next song, ‘SELF IMMOLATION’. During a cover of Bob Dylan’s ‘Masters of War’ and ‘BRAINROT’, the first few fans climbed up the stage to stagedive – a small preview of what was to come later in the evening.
On INERTIA, grandson collaborated with only one other artist: Bob Vylan. Before performing this collaboration, called ‘WHO’S THE ENEMY’, the singer took the time to speak up about the ongoing genocide in Gaza, and afterwards, he and the audience chanted “free Palestine” together. The music then started back up as he played ‘Welcome to Paradise’ from Death of an Optimist, which the artist had never performed on tour before. His band left the stage as the final notes faded out. “Dankjewel dat jullie hier zijn,” grandson told the audience in Dutch as he was preparing his guitar for the “one slow sad fucking song”, ‘Heather’. The singer dedicated this song to those we’ve lost, and the audience’s flashlights lit up the room as the first notes sounded out. Slowly, everyone sat down to create a truly intimate, cozy atmosphere, and some tears were definitely shed.
For the final portion of the night, the energy got picked back up right away with ‘Drones’ and ‘YOU MADE ME THIS WAY’. It truly went crazy, however, when, during ‘Blood // Water’, the song that gained the singer a lot of fans back in 2018, more and more people began climbing on the stage. Not to stagedive, but simply to be up there jumping, singing, and dancing with the artist. The night was not supposed to go like this, as grandson usually invites people up later, but he took it in stride. As the fans up on the stage, as well as those in the audience, chanted for more, the singer treated them to one final song. ‘Stick Up’ was played with everyone still on stage, and the singer even took the time to take a few selfies before ending this amazing night.
