The All Hope Is Gone World Tour was a concert tour by Slipknot that took place in 2008 and 2009 in support of the group's fourth studio album All Hope Is Gone. The tour consisted of nine legs and took place in the United States, Canada, Japan, Australia, New Zealand, and Europe. The tour started with the Mayhem Festival 2008.

Lawrence Upton acted as the tour's director, Philippe Vachon acted as the tour's programmer and lighting co-director, and Dave Watson as lighting designer. Equipment such as LED units and Martin Atomic 3000 Strobes were used on the rig, and instead of a media server, the GrandMA mixing console was used for MA Lighting. David "Shirt" Nicholls was positioned as audio mixer, working with the digital mixing console.

Slipknot headlined every performance throughout the tour, sometimes sharing headlining status at festival appearances. Supporting acts throughout the tour included Disturbed, DragonForce, Mastodon, Machine Head, Children of Bodom, Coheed and Cambria, Trivium, 3 Inches of Blood, DevilDriver, The Black Dahlia Murder, and Sydonia. The tour consisted of nine legs and 153 shows, beginning on July 9, 2008, and finishing on October 31, 2009. This was also Slipknot's last tour to feature their full original lineup with bassist Paul Gray before his death on May 24, 2010.

Turntablist Sid Wilson broke both of his heels after jumping from an elevated area of a stage and landing incorrectly. He performed all dates of the tour, in a wheelchair. Drummer Joey Jordison sustained a broken ankle, causing four concerts to be cancelled. Towards the end of the leg Fehn left the tour due to a death in his family, forcing him to miss the final two dates of the leg in Spain. Shawn Crahan left the Canadian part of the tour to return home to his family.

Background In early February 2008, Mick Thomson confirmed that Slipknot would be performing at the 2008 Mayhem Festival."SLIPKNOT Guitarist: 'We Don't Repeat Ourselves As Artists'" . Blabbermouth.net. February 8, 2008. Corey Taylor said: "This summer we are truly bringing Mayhem. Slipknot is excited to be a part of it, and to be able to bring the new chapter of our history to the masses. We are already working, building and designing a new show.""SLIPKNOT, DISTURBED, DRAGONFORCE, MASTODON: Complete 'Rockstar Energy Mayhem' Details Revealed" . Blabbermouth.net. January 30, 2008. The tour acted as a follow-up to The Subliminal Verses World Tour, which took place in 2004 to promote their third studio album Vol. 3: (The Subliminal Verses)."SLIPKNOT, AS I LAY DYING, UNEARTH Tour Dates Announced" . Blabbermouth.net. October 11, 2005. The band began recording their fourth studio album All Hope Is Gone in late February 2008.

Lighting Lawrence Upton acted as the tour's director, and Philippe Vachon acted as the tour's programmer and lighting co-director. Vachon said Upton wanted "very aggressive lighting that would attack and have punch", because Slipknot's music was very aggressive. Up-stage provided the gear package, which included 10 Martin Professional MAC Profiles and 54 Martin Mac 2000 Wash units. Assistant lighting designer Dave Watson explained that the Martin Professional MAC Profiles were used as "key lights", while Martin Mac 2000 Wash units generated higher light output. Issues arose during the tour, specifically times when members were barely visible due to the lighting. Vachon said, "There is so much show in your face that we would lose the guys on stage; we had to beef up the front-of-house [with] white."

The rig consisted of a Front of House truss, two three-quarter angled trusses, and two straight mid-stage trusses. These were all located up-stage, and had two sub-hung trusses directly below them. There were two Lycian Starklite medium-throw truss spots, and an accumulation of specialty lights. The specialty lights included 54 two-light Molefays, six PAR 36 rotating beacons, 24 Martin Atomic 300 Strobes, 2 six-light Molefays, and 10 four-light Molefays. The rig also had LED units, which can be very bright, and which shone into the audience. Throughout the tour, 65 Philips Color Kinetics ColorBlast 12s, seven Color Blaze 48s, and twelve CK ColorBlaze 72s were used to light up the wall behind the band.

Instead of a media server, the GrandMA console was used for MA Lighting. Vachon explained that the GrandMA console was "the desk you can do the most with LEDs; if you want to go further, you need a media serverCTB." The assistant lighting designer used a full-sized GrandMA console. Two NSPs provided the necessary extra channels. The show's color palette was somewhat restricted. There was mostly white lights, but Upton used lighter colors to get the most light output. The original palette was also based on colors like amber, steel blue, sea green, and orange. Late in the tour Vachon would add additional bursts of color, which included intense oranges, reds, and violets.

Sound production David "Shirt" Nicholls was the audio mixer, using a Digidesign Venue with both the Eventide Anthology Pack, which provided sound effects, and Venue Pro Pack, which was a complete digital mixing console. Nicholls has expressed his admiration for the Venue Pro Pack and also explained that the A-T 4050 microphones which he used on the tour took a battering during shows. Nicholls has called the T6100 vocal microphones he used "bulletproof" as they would occasionally "go flying up into the seats" during shows but would still work the next show. The Meyer P.A., which accumulates 16 MILO seat boxes, nine Nexo CD-18 subwoofers, and six flown HP700s on the ground per side, was provided by Thunder Audio.

The system was controlled by Meyer Sound Galileo. The side-hang featured 10 MICA boxes per side, with four UPJs for front-fills. Ron Hurd, the tour's monitor engineer, mixed the show using a Yamaha PM5D console. Hurd said, "I'm not using any plug-ins or rack gear except for an [Apogee] Big Ben word clock. Six of the nine guys are on ears: Ultimate Ears with Sennheiser G2s."

Mayhem Festival

Slipknot began touring at the first ever Mayhem Festival, a music festival founded by Kevin Lyman and John Reese. During the opening date of the Mayhem Festival 2008 on July 9 at Auburn, Washington, turntablist Sid Wilson broke both of his heels after jumping from an elevated area of the stage and landing incorrectly. Despite the injury, he promised to perform on all dates of the tour in a wheelchair. Wilson returned to the band, in a wheelchair and with both his legs in casts, on the second date of the festival at Mountain View, California; he did, however, perform without the wheelchair at times.

The second date of the Mayhem Festival in Marysville, California, on July 11 was rescheduled to July 14 due to wildfires in the area.

Tour dates Date City Country VenueWith: Disturbed, DragonForce, Mastodon and othersJuly 9, 2008AuburnUnited StatesWhite River AmphitheatreJuly 11, 2008WheatlandSleep Train AmphitheatreJuly 12, 2008Mountain ViewShoreline AmphitheatreJuly 13, 2008San BernardinoSan Manuel AmphitheaterJuly 14, 2008WheatlandSleep Train AmphitheatreJuly 15, 2008FresnoSave Mart CenterJuly 16, 2008Chula VistaCricket Wireless AmphitheatreJuly 18, 2008PhoenixCricket Wireless PavilionJuly 19, 2008AlbuquerqueJournal PavilionJuly 20, 2008Greenwood VillageFiddler's Green AmphitheatreJuly 22, 2008Bonner SpringsVerizon Wireless AmphitheatreJuly 23, 2008Maryland HeightsVerizon Wireless AmphitheaterJuly 25, 2008DallasSuperPages.com CenterJuly 26, 2008SelmaVerizon Wireless AmphitheaterJuly 27, 2008HoustonSam Houston Race ParkJuly 29, 2008TampaFord AmphitheatreJuly 30, 2008West Palm BeachCruzan AmphitheatreAugust 1, 2008Virginia BeachVerizon Wireless AmphitheaterAugust 2, 2008BurgettstownPost-Gazette PavilionAugust 3, 2008ScrantonToyota PavilionAugust 5, 2008MansfieldComcast CenterAugust 6, 2008UniondaleNassau ColiseumAugust 8, 2008TorontoCanadaDownsview ParkAugust 9, 2008ClarkstonUnited StatesDTE Energy Music TheatreAugust 10, 2008Tinley ParkFirst Midwest Bank AmphitheatreAugust 12, 2008AtlantaLakewood AmphitheatreAugust 13, 2008NoblesvilleVerizon Wireless Music CenterAugust 15, 2008CamdenSusquehanna Bank CenterAugust 16, 2008HartfordNew England Dodge Music CenterAugust 17, 2008BristowNissan PavilionAugust 18, 2008CorfuDarien Lake Performing Arts Center

Critical reception Critics noted the band's energy and on-stage presence during their Mayhem Festival sets. Matt Weitz credited the band's use of the stage in Dallas, saying they were "severe in their presentation." When reviewing the show at Burgettstown, Pennsylvania, Justin Jacobs said Slipknot "[delivered] the pummeling performance the whole crowd had been waiting for", while noting that part of Slipknot's appeal was their secrecy, referring to the band's use of masks and aliases and the fact that a curtain was used to hide the stage while it was set up.

Cancelled European dates At the end of the 2008 Mayhem Festival, drummer Joey Jordison broke his ankle. During an interview with Drummer, Jordison explained that the injury happened when he and a friend were "messing around and kinda wrestling with each other" one afternoon, and Jordison tripped and twisted his ankle. Despite the injury, Jordison could still walk and subsequently played the next night. However, during a lengthy double bass section of "The Blister Exists" he "felt a snap" in his ankle. A doctor confirmed he had broken his ankle and suggested surgery. Jordison continued to play with a broken ankle until the band finished the Mayhem Festival. Following the festival Jordison was told that if he continued to play, he could permanently damage his ability to walk. Subsequently, Slipknot were forced to cancel their European festival appearances due to the injury. On August 22, at Leeds Festival during the Dropkick Murphys performance, a plane flew above the open air crowd advertising tickets for Slipknot's UK dates in December. Unhappy with the fact that the band had pulled out of the festival, the crowd began to boo at the banner advert.

Tour dates Date City Country VenueAugust 22, 2008LeedsEnglandReading and Leeds FestivalsAugust 24, 2008ReadingAugust 26, 2008ParisFranceLe Trabendo (Virgin 17 showcase)August 27, 2008HamburgGermanyGrosse Freiheit 36 (MTV showcase)August 29, 2008WiesenAustriaEwean FestivalAugust 31, 2008LüdinghausenGermanyArea 4 Festival

Japanese leg

During an interview prior to the Japanese leg of the tour, percussionist Shawn Crahan discussed the difference between Japanese audiences and Western audiences. When asked whether he believed that Japanese fans are less intense, he said it is a matter of opinion for bands and when Slipknot play, "it's almost frightening how in to it they are." However, he did note that between songs can be "very awkward" because the crowd is almost silent, whereas the band is used to a more energetic reception.

Tour dates Date City Country VenueSupported by: Machine HeadOctober 8, 2008NagoyaJapanZeppOctober 10, 2008TokyoStudio CoastOctober 11, 2008October 14, 2008OsakaZeppOctober 15, 2008October 16, 2008SendaiZeppWith: Avenged Sevenfold, Dragonforce, Mötley Crüe and othersOctober 18, 2008TokyoJapanLoud Park Festival

Australian/New Zealand leg The Australian leg of the All Hope Is Gone World Tour was the first time Slipknot were able to bring what percussionist Shawn Crahan described as "the real set, the real deal" to an Australian audience. The band travelled with over 11 tons of equipment, including hydraulic drum risers, percussionist rigs, pyrotechnics, lighting and stage set-ups. During an interview prior to the band's first show of this leg, vocalist Corey Taylor revealed that he had sprained his thumb the day before while sky-diving; however, the injury did not prevent him from performing.

Tour dates