The Masquerade - Atlanta - May 12, 2011
Before this show, the one common thread that had held nearly all my of my previous concert experiences together was that there was always at least one band that just sucked. It's just one of those necessary evils, I guess. While Baroness/Deftones and Alice in Chains/Deftones/Mastodon were two lean, mean, incredible lineups without any duds, (Gee, what do they have in common?) even shows with smaller lineups can suck. Whatever band opened for Kings of Leon when I last saw them was awful. Of course, Kings of Leon sucked pretty bad that night, too.
You see, when that dud band goes on stage, you can't help but turn into an impatient grump. At the beginning of their set, you find yourself asking questions like "Who is this guy?" or "Does his sister know that he's wearing her jeans?" One or two shitty songs later, you start doing the Set List Math: "Okay, if they're the second band on tonight, that means they're supposed to play about 30 minutes. Let's see, they just finished their third song, so they should have…two, three songs left?" It's like the metal show version of counting sheep.
Pfffffft.
Well, I'm happy to say that all four bands were excellent at this show. Even the token local opener was good. OBSIDIAN SKY started the concert on a good note; they categorized themselves as "progressive metalcore," and they laid down a nice, thick, chunky groove. The occasional guitar harmony was nice, and breakdowns were used both tastefully and sparingly. I'd give them a [7/10].
Up next was a band that I had heard a ton about from critics and metal blogs, but knew little about. THE OCEAN is a band from Berlin that has been described as "ambient doom rock," among countless other things. They have elements of sludge metal and progressive rock, and one of their records features two thirds of the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra. Simply put, this band absolutely destroyed. The slower, melodic parts created a dark, moody vibe, and their creepy background videos did wonders in adding to the ambiance. The band would spend five minutes of a song in that slower gear and then they would just explode into the frenetic, brutal parts. The singer must have done at least seven stage dives, and was accompanied by the lead guitarist on one occasion. And this went on for 40 minutes. Insane. I don't know enough about music to do this band justice by writing about them, so just check out this song. I'd give them a [10/10].
JOB FOR A COWBOY were up next, and they were another band that I was curious to see. Most metal purists hate this band for some reason; I guess it's because they started out as a deathcore band but then switched to a more traditional death metal style. I know this is like me talking in Chinese to both of the people reading this, but deathcore is just a bunch of palm muted riffing, dissonance, (mostly poor) growls, and in most cases, a comically excessive number of breakdowns. I agree that 90 percent of deathcore bands are shitty copies of the other 10 percent, but a couple of them are pretty legit. (See: Whitechapel). Well, JFAC put on a great show. Jon "The Charn" Rice was an animal behind the kit and frontman Jonny Davy squealed, roared, and screeched his way through the songs. The highlight of the set was the crowd favorite, "Entombment of a Machine." [8/10].
BETWEEN THE BURIED AND ME served as the evening's headliners, and they didn't disappoint. Their songs are really long, but they're still an incredible band to watch play. If you want to read my attempt at categorizing them, please check out my last blog post. All you need to know is that there are two guitarists, a bassist, a drummer, and a frontman (who looks just like Burn Notice's Michael Westen) who doubles as a keyboardist. They play a melange of every type of metal imaginable…usually in the same song. They jammed for a solid hour and change before taking a break, and then came back for the encore. It was at this point that I realized that BTBAM were about to serenade us with one of the most beautiful metal songs ever written: "Selkies: The Endless Obsession." I immediately jockeyed for position right in front of epic lead guitarist Paul Waggoner, waiting for the song's keyboard intro. About four minutes later, it was epic solo time. For the rest of the song, it felt like a little angel baby had flown into the venue and sat on top of my head just before massaging my ears with his feet. Unfortunately, every solo has to end, and when the band finished "Selkies," it was time to go. I left the Masquerade satisfied and pleasantly surprised. [9/10].
No comments:
Post a Comment