LIVE IN HARRISBURG: ROYAL THUNDER, ANCIENT VVISDOM, AND BACKWOODS PAYBACK (Feb. 28, 2013)

 Concert Reviews, Exceptions to the Rule  1 Response »
Mar 012013
 

(In this post, guest contributor The Uncool Guy Down the Hall gives us a show review with photos.)

I thought while Islander is off working on his Evil Super-Science project this would be the perfect opportunity to break the NCS rules and present an all clean singing review. And while I know Islander did provide a review (here) of Ancient VVisdom and Royal Thunder along with Pallbearer when they supported Enslaved, the focus of that review was (understandably) more on Enslaved. I’d like to put the focus on Royal Thunder and Ancient VVisdom for this review, as well as perhaps introduce Backwoods Payback to the NCS readers who may not have heard of them.

First off let me talk about the venue a little bit. The Fed Live is located in downtown Harrisburg, PA, a city well known around the Commonwealth not only for being the location of the state capital, but also for having filed for bankruptcy. This, combined with the fact they were hosting three metal acts, did not give me high expectations of the place.

Turns out, the bar/restaurant portion of venue (The Federal Taphouse) is a rather upscale place featuring a tap room of over 100 craft/micro brew beers and a respectable food menu. Getting there pretty early and having time to kill, I indulged in both the food and beer offerings, feeling a bit out of place mixed in with the after work suit and tie clad business types and/or legislators, but the food and beer were both excellent. Continue reading »

PAIN – LIVE AT THE HAIRY DOG, DERBY, FEB 16, 2013

 Concert Reviews  1 Response »
Feb 192013
 

(Our UK-based correspondent Sir Andy Synn experienced his first concert by Sweden’s PAIN in Derby, England, on Feb 16, 2013, and files this report, accompanied by his own copious videos of the experience.)

Ah… Pain. One of many projects of the legendary Peter Tägtgren, where he lives out his electro-rock, industrialised-dance-metal fantasies. They’re all about big riffs, pulsing synths, and heavy beats. They’re also a band I’ve never managed to see before, so tonight’s experience was going to be one for the books.

One thing that became almost immediately apparent about the band was how painfully tight (no pun intended) they were as a live unit, producing an intense heavy metal experience that came straight at the audience in a wall of light and sound. The quartet’s live guitar tone was absolutely crushing, only slightly let down by an occasionally muted lead line, while the thrumming bass and slippery, strafing drums locked together into a tight, sexy groove.

Also immediately noticeable was the odd variety of clientele in attendance. The venue was impressively packed, with individuals and groups from all the different metal tribes. There were balding old-school rockers, pierced punks and neophyte nu-metallers, a host of over- (and under-) dressed goth chicks (varying from emaciated to elephantine), and almost every other permutation of metalhead you could think of! Continue reading »

LIVE IN SEATTLE: ENSLAVED, PALLBEARER, ROYAL THUNDER, AND ANCIENT VVISDOM (Feb 11, 2013)

 Concert Reviews  4 Responses »
Feb 132013
 

On February 11, 2013, the night before Enslaved received their seventh Norwegian Grammy nomination, I had the pleasure of seeing them perform in Seattle at a bar called The Highline, which is rapidly becoming my favorite place in town to hear live metal. Somehow, despite its very small size, it’s booking some really amazing tours. It’s a clean, cozy, comfortable place with cool people working there (Dylan Desmond from Bell Witch was behind the bar this night, and I’m pretty sure I saw his bandmate Arian Guerra helping out, too), and they make some good cocktails.

Enslaved weren’t the only draw for what turned out to be a jam-packed audience. Three bands who had breakout years in 2012 were also along for the ride: Arkansas’s Pallbearer was the direct support, preceded by Ancient VVisdom from my hometown of Austin and Atlanta’s Royal Thunder.

I was somewhat familiar with Ancient VVisdom’s music (having featured them in this post at the end of 2011), but I must be the only metal blogger in creation to have missed Pallbearer’s critically acclaimed 2012 album Sorrow and Extinction, and I think I’ve previously heard a grand total of one song by Royal Thunder. So yeah, I was pretty much there for Enslaved.

Nevertheless, I and my friends got to the Highline early enough to grab places to sit on a raised area that runs down the left side of the floor against the wall. We were so far forward that we were almost — but not quite — on the side of the stage, as you’ll see from the angle of the photos I took. And yes, I’m sorry to tell you that this review, as usual, will include a lot of my amateur concert pics. Continue reading »

LIVE IN SEATTLE: GOJIRA, THE DEVIN TOWNSEND PROJECT, AND THE ATLAS MOTH – Jan 20, 2013

 Concert Reviews  16 Responses »
Jan 222013
 

On Sunday night, January 20, the current tour headlined by Gojira and also featuring The Devin Townsend Project and The Atlas Moth rolled into Seattle, and a good-sized group of friends and I showed up at Studio Seven to bear witness.  We had bought tickets in advance, which was fortunate, because although we arrived about 45 minutes before doors, the show was already sold out.

I was still trying to process the fact that we were getting to see Gojira and DT together on the same tour, and in a venue the cozy size of Studio Seven. I’m a huge fan of both, and I also really enjoyed the last album by The Atlas Moth (An Ache For the Distance), so this had the makings of a stupendous experience. And so it proved to be.

A couple of us grabbed perches up against the rail in the balcony bar overlooking the stage and never left those spots. I wanted a place where I could take some photos of the show, and I didn’t really feel like being smashed inside a high-pressure, breathless, sweaty mass of humanity on the floor for this show anyway.

After the jump, some impressions of what I saw and heard, plus a fuckload of amateurish pics. Continue reading »

LIVE REPORT: DEATH GRIPS at THE MAGIC STICK, DETROIT, 11-19-12

 Concert Reviews, That's Music -- But It's Not Metal  2 Responses »
Jan 142013
 


 

(NCS writer BadWolf was in the audience when Death Grips played Detroit last November, and he provides the following report.  The very cool photos accompanying this review were taken by BadWolf’s partner in crime, Nicholas Vechery.)

This show was a long time coming. I first heard Death Grips almost exactly a year ago to the week as I write this article, and almost instantly the group became something of a personal muse to me—I wasted no time pimping the group here, and later made them the subject of my first article for Stereogum. In 2012 the band released two albums, both excellent, and in between booked-then-cancelled a major summer tour. For better or for worse, 2012 saw MC Ride and drummer Zach Hill ride the popularity wave at its very zenith, leaving many of their loyal fans tumbling in the surf. So when Death Grips booked a second tour, and played Detroit’s Magic Stick on November 19, attendance was mandatory.

I attended the show with photographer Nick Vechery, too late to catch any of the tour’s opening act, genre-bending MC Mykki Blanco. Although Blanco hails from NYC’s now-prominent Brooklyn hip-hop scene, I find his music less appealing than, say, Azalia Banks on her 1991 EP.

Death Grips took the stage just after Vechery and I purchased our beer. Continue reading »

KATATONIA / ALCEST / JUNIUS – LIVE AT RESCUE ROOMS, NOTTINGHAM, DEC 18, 2012

 Concert Reviews  3 Responses »
Dec 242012
 

(NCS writer Andy Synn turns in this review of the live performances by Katatonia, Alcest, and Junius in Nottingham, England on December 18, 2012. Andy also filmed videos of the performances, which appear at the end of the review.)

Funnily enough, for some reason I was a little apprehensive about this show. In hindsight I’m not entirely certain why, as Katatonia were, without a doubt, in the best form I’ve ever seen them at Summer Breeze earlier this year. I can really only ascribe my trepidation to my own lukewarm reaction to the new album.

Thankfully though, there was really very little to worry about, as the Swedes have, for the past several years, been improving as a tight, driven live act, their moody sound much improved by the three-way vocal interplay that they’ve pretty much perfected now.

But before the headliners, we had two other bands, who would both provide their own form of deeply emotive musical catharsis. Continue reading »

LIVE REPORT: CORROSION OF CONFORMITY, SKELETONWITCH, RED FANG, BLACK TUSK, AND HAVOK (The Magic Stick, Detroit MI, 11-16-12)

 Concert Reviews  3 Responses »
Dec 172012
 

(BadWolf and friends took in the show at Detroit’s Magic Stick co-headlined by Corrosion of Conformity and Skeletonwitch on November 16 and provides this review, with pics by Nick Vechery.)

I go to so many concerts that I forget live music is a celebration. When a band plays, the audience takes on a responsibility to express great feeling—vocally, physically, and of course through liver deterioration. It is easier to have a good time at a show not only when the bands are good, but when there is an occasion to celebrate. In the case of Corrosion of Conformity and Skeletonwitch’s co-headlining show, my wolf pack and I had much to celebrate.

My longstanding photographer and concert partner, Sir Nick Vechery, just celebrated his one year anniversary with his wonderful Significant Other, Whitney. [HAPPY ANNIVERSARY, GUYS!] Her gift to him? Skeletonwitch tickets. At the same time, we celebrated our first year of reporting for No Clean Singing. We loaded my car up with some Pabst and Toledo arts reporter Ian Hubbard, and trekked to The Magic Stick.

The Magic Stick boasts a fine bar, plenty of room, a loud stereo, and a huge second-story smoking patio with a gorgeous view of metro Detroit. The venue sits on top of a bowling alley, another bar, and a snack shoppe (the pizza was quite delicious, if a bit greasy). It stands as one of the finest venues I’ve ever visited, and I highly recommend that any NCS readers with the opportunity to spend money there do so. In the past two months I’ve seen four concerts there and cannot wait to return. Continue reading »

VHÖL, BOSSE-DE-NAGE, AND LAWLESS: LIVE IN SAN FRANCISCO – DEC 7, 2012

 Concert Reviews  4 Responses »
Dec 112012
 

EDITOR’S NOTE: Please welcome a new guest writer who calls himself stop_arcturus. He brings us the following review of the second-ever live performances by a “super group” about whom we’ve been quite intrigued since we first found out about the band’s formation — VHÖL. At the same show, stop_arcturus also caught a rare performance by Bosse-de-Nage (whose most recent split we reviewed recently), as well as the opening set of another Bay Area band whose debut demo we reviewed here — Lawless.

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VHÖL played the Elbo Room in San Francisco with Lawless and Bosse-de-Nage.

Despite an apparent lack of local promotion, San Francisco’s Elbo Room, an intensely intimate venue, was packed by the time newly minted Profound Lore act VHÖL took the stage. No wonder, considering three of the four members have deep roots in the Bay Area metal scene. Aesop Dekker (Agalloch, Worm Oroborus) was a member of the now-disbanded SF black metal band Ludicra, while Sigrid Sheie plays keys and sings in Hammers of Misfortune. VHÖL guitarist John Cobbett was an integral member of Ludicra and still is with Hammers, as well as having been involved with GWAR and Slough Feg. Only vocalist Mike Scheidt (YOB), VHÖL’s ostensible leader and frontman, hails from outside the Bay. Continue reading »

LIVE IN SEATTLE: WINTERSUN AND ELUVEITIE, DEC. 2, 2012

 Concert Reviews  7 Responses »
Dec 042012
 

There’s nothing that will get you excited for a metal show quite like arriving at a Seattle venue in December twenty minutes after the doors are supposed to open, only to find that the doors haven’t opened and and that you get to stand in a cold, drizzling rain for 20 more minutes near the end of a motionless line of water-logged metalheads that snakes around the block.

I’m here to tell you: That will make you really eager to get inside. The poor motherfuckers who’d been standing near the front of the line for an hour must have really been stoked.

I wish I could say this is the first time such a thing has happened to me, but there seems to be an unwritten rule (at least at Seattle venues) that doors will not open until at least half an hour after the doors are supposed to open. I could understand this if the venues had their employees walking the lines selling hot dogs with cream cheese and grilled onions, but all El Corazon had for us on the night of December 2 was a dude with a megaphone repeatedly broadcasting to everyone that if you didn’t have everything removed from your pockets by the time you reached the door for the pat-down, you would be sent to the end of the line. This did not taste as good as a hot dog.

It did feel good to get inside, though I was already plenty excited to see Varg, Wintersun, and Eluveitie even before the bonus of a twenty-minute wait in the rain. Once inside, my friends and I made a bee-line to the bar, thinking that a shot of rye and a PBR would help un-freeze our guts. In the bar we came across members of two local bands (Blood and Thunder and The Devils of Loudon) and proceeded to drink and talk our way straight through most of Varg’s opening set. So I have no review of Varg’s show. I blame the rain. And the rye. Continue reading »

CARNOTAURUS

 Concert Reviews  28 Responses »
Nov 272012
 

Travis “The Virus” Helton is a friend of mine who’s the vocalist and guitarist in a three-man Seattle death metal group named Carnotaurus. I’ve talked with him about the band numerous times and listened to some of the band’s early recordings (when “the band” was just Travis and a drum machine), but had never made it to one of their gigs until last night. They played at Seattle’s 2 Bit Saloon (a very cool place, btw), and I showed up along with a group of other mutual friends of Travis and mine.

To be honest, I was a little nervous. Travis is a wonderful person and a walking encyclopedia when it comes to metal, but what if his band turned out not to be very good? I mean, I’m not a very good liar, except when I’m making up stories about the NCS loris horde. What would I say if the music proved to be disappointing?

Well, thankfully, I needn’t have worried, because I had a fuckin’ blast listening to Carnotaurus. In fact, I liked them so much I thought their show deserved this post. Also, my confounding camera decided to play nice with me for a change and I got some decent pics of the venue and the Carnotaurus set. I’m including some of those at the end of this review.

In a nutshell, Carnotaurus sound like a full-throttle battle tank. I don’t mean one of those slick, modern-day, high-tech M1’s that cost about $5 million a copy. I’m talking about something from the last World War that has somehow survived the decades while remaining just as destructive as ever — loud, heavy, rusted-out, belching noxious fumes, scattering metal shards, throwing pistons and treads, and just crushing everything in its path. Continue reading »

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