The last
time Buffalo’s favourite sons were in town it was the day after the Paris
attacks, and the gig provided some much needed catharsis with a night of
solidarity and overwhelming positivity. It was a truly special show. Tonight, they returned, touring a much
stronger album, and without the tragic backdrop. The question being: would they have them same
impact without the emotional circumstances.
Up first is
Albany, New York’s Drug Church; a band about whom I knew nothing. Melding the kind of melodic post-hardcore
kind of stuff that made Poison The Well and Handsome so good, to some straight
up punk aggression, they were bloody impressive. Singer Patrick Kindlon’s stage banter was
priceless and endearing, and his performance was by turns trance-like
gesticulations, and looking like a man having an argument with somebody who
wasn’t there. Brilliant. Drug Church offer melodies, textures, riffs
and screaming; I knew nothing about them but I was suddenly very curious.
Next up are
’68. Never heard of them either but I
later found out that the lunatic on guitar and vocals was Josh Scogin, formerly
of Norma Jean and The Chariot, both of whom are/were ace. The two-piece are doing exactly what Royal
Blood should be doing on their next album, assuming of course they want to
alienate and frighten any indie fuckwit fans they've picked up. Setting their stage with drummer and
guitarist facing each other and not the crowd, they are strange from the off
and get weirder as they go on. They
sound not unlike The Melvins’ fuzzier moments, and Scogin offers an impressive
range of screams and one-handed guitar technique. It’s mesmerising stuff and has the audience
baffled and hooked in equal measure.
Special prize for best stage banter, too: “I’d like to thank each and
every one of my friends… for being in my band.”
Every Time I
Die seem incapable of half measures.
Incapable of dialling it in.
Incapable of anything less than full throttle. A new album every couple of years, most of
them ace, heavy touring and a frightening level of intensity at every
show. 8 albums in, they now have a
wealth of material to choose from and tonight’s set draws heavily from this
year’s Low Teens. Opening with savage new song ‘Glitches’,
which gives way to ‘We’rewolf’, at which point singer Keith Buckley invites the
audience up onstage. They oblige and
from that point on, the show is barely controlled bedlam.
While we get
a lot from Low Teens, including
brilliant single ‘The Coin Has A Say’ and the slower-paced Southern Rock of ‘It
Remembers’ (Buckley doing an admirable job of Brendon Urie’s melodic chorus),
the band know that the older songs still get the moshpit going. ‘Floater’ causes some serious chaos and ‘Bored
Stiff’ kicks off a circle pit which stops only for the audience to join in with
the refrain “Hey there! Girls! I’m a cunt!”
The sleazy gutter-punk riffs of ‘The New Black’ are as fun as ever and
slot in nicely alongside new songs like the off-kilter ‘Fear & Trembling’
and riff driven ‘Religion Of Speed’.
ETID are
tight as you would expect, having kept the same lineup for a while now, with
guitarists Jordan Buckley and Andy Williams (also a wrestler, scarily huge)
totally in sync with one another. Keith
Buckley spends much of his time being mobbed by enthusiastic fans trying to
sing along into his mic. He welcomes this
and encourages them, and creates a community atmosphere where fans routinely
hug each other between songs, and always stop to pick up fallen moshers (of
which, there were many…), and the stage is simply an extension of the moshpit.
I’m up on
stage with them for the last few songs, including the multi-tempo groove of ‘No
Son Of Mine’ and closing number ‘Map Change’.
It’s an exhausting and exhilarating night on which I discovered two new
bands, whose names I will look out for in future, and a band who never lets me
down stayed true to form and didn’t let me down. It’s a year in which I’ve seen Pearl Jam and
Therapy? live but this band would give anyone a run for their money. I often wish more people would take notice of
them, but you have to wonder whether a larger venue would have the same magic,
because that’s exactly what tonight was. Even thought I was kicked in the head by a
crowd surfer.
No comments:
Post a Comment