Awesome club moment #3 | I discover magical summoning powers at the Aesthetic Perfection gig

I’m going to call this post “I discover magical summoning powers at the Aesthetic Perfection gig”. Alternatively, “a funny thing happened to me on the way to the Aesthetic Perfection concert” will do. Or even “Toto, I’ve a feeling we’re not at the Aesthetic Perfection gig anymore.”

In 2010, which is a date that feels like it was far more recent than it actually was, I got to see EBM-industrial-pop outfit Aesthetic Perfection on their Australian tour. The show was organised by Rivetting Promotions (sic) and Fiend, and since it was the Melbourne leg, it was attended by a bunch of people, including Gerry (aka Lobotomy) from Fiend. Try to remember that bit because it relates to the rest of the story.

Aesthetic Perfection front-man Daniel Graves demonstrates the correct procedure for initiating the summoning ritual. Pic: Ruth.

To be clear: this post isn’t strictly about the gig. Just take my word that it was a fantastic show and Daniel Graves is a top front-man. This was despite a couple things not being quite in favour of the band. For one, the stage was very small, so much so that I vaguely recall that the drum kit may even have been positioned somewhat less frontal for everything to fit. Also, the sound wasn’t the best, though through no fault of Aesthetic Perfection or the promoters — the room in which they played simply wasn’t intended for thumping industrial music.

The gig wasn’t sold out but when Aesthetic Perfection did their thing it felt massive. This was an industrial music outfit beaming with energy and I genuinely believe that for a not inconsiderable amount of time the whole room was up and at it.

And, of course, Aesthetic Perfection make great music. Plus, Daniel Graves seemed like a lovely chap who was nice enough to hang out with the fans afterwards. I even have a selfie with the lads buried somewhere in my archives.

But as I said, this isn't about the band, as good as they were.

What really makes a great gig?

Great gigs are often memorable because of something unusual or unexpected. Ozzy Osbourne and Dream Theater have played thousands of concerts but the individual shows that are still talked about are when Ozzy bit the head off a bat (and incidentally got tons of publicity from the rabies shots) or when Dream Theater unexpectedly played the entirety of Master Of Puppets or The Number Of The Beast before actually doing a full-length‘proper’ set.

So too was it with this occasion. That’s because the Aesthetic Perfection show will for me always be the time I discovered I had magical summoning powers.

And just in case you were wondering, yes, a higher than average volume of alcohol was involved.

2010? Was it really so long ago?

This peculiar discovery occurred during the last break between bands — Sirus had finished and Aesthetic Perfection were up next. I’d gone outside to grab some fresh air, which of course meant hanging out with the smokers who stampeded to the exit the moment Sirus had finished.

I’d struck up a conversation with an old mate. You may know the type — a gig acquaintance who you don’t see outside of shows but you always get along with fine at shows. We were talking about music (of course) and people and ‘the scene’ (because I was significantly younger then) when one of us just happened to refer to someone by name.

At that precise moment, the person we had just mentioned by name casually emerged from the venue entrance.

“Well,” old mate and I conveyed to each other, as we metaphorically slapped each other on the back.

As I said, we’d had a few drinks.

We continued our banter, dropping more names and bands and more bands, when the same thing occurred. Again, someone we’d referred to by name mysteriously exited the venue and was standing in the door way.

“Good Lord!” we both thought, which is quite probably a polite interpretation of the words we actually uttered.

Again, we’d had a little more than usual to drink. So, naturally, we drew attention to this occurrence by making a noisy and obnoxiously big deal of it.

Obviously, we then thought it’d be pretty funny if we channelled our collective consciousness and attempted to make somebody else materialise in the doorway.

It went something like this.

Old Mate: “Gerry!” (referring to Gerry the promoter)

Me: “Great idea, let’s summon Gerry!”

Old Mate: “Ok. Bring me Gerry. Gerry, Gerry, Gerry. Gerry Gerry. Bring me Gerry!”

Now, most likely it was coincidence. Or maybe there was some other influence.

Either way, sure enough, standing right there in the doorway, was Gerry.

By now you can probably imagine how we responded. And when Old Mate and I finally calmed down we explained what had just occurred.

And Gerry, with brilliant wit and perfect timing, responded.

“Yeah, I was just standing in the venue when I had this sudden urge to step outside,” he said.

"Ph’nglui mglw’nafh Cthulhu Gerry Gerry Gerry R’lyeh wgah’ngl fhtagn!" Pic: Ruth

Did I mention it was a great gig? Aesthetic Perfection put on a killer performance despite being challenged for space on stage. No one left disappointed that night.

Plus, you never know when you'll discover that you have magical summoning powers.

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Awesome club moment #2 | I discover what hardcore is about with the DJ Producer and friends

Here’s one about a DJ who toured Australia. The occasion was the DJ Producer (read the comments behind that link to get an idea of what many hardcore techno gabber types think of him) and while musical instrument-playing purists may argue one particular old chestnut — that to play pre-recorded music is not a ‘proper’ gig — this was a monster occasion in every sense other than the fact that there weren’t a bunch of people on a stage playing stringed instruments. On the other hand, it was a club venue (Inflation), so I’m counting it as a Memorable Club Moment.

The DJ Producer smashes Melbourne

The DJ Producer. Not actually in Melbourne in this photo. Pic: Discogs.com

There are a couple of reasons why this night remains memorable, despite the grandiose volume of alcohol consumed and the fact that it occurred almost10 years ago.

In 2007 (yes, it was that long ago) I had kind of started to get into hardcore techno, gabber and breakcore. I had genuine dreams of DJing this kind of music at actual club nights and (perhaps somewhat naively) I made a point of purchasing a whole bunch of this music on vinyl. I was determined to somehow be the real deal, whatever that was, and, as this still the pre-streaming-everything or even pre-everything-is-on-YouTube era (remember, YouTube only started in 2005), I refused to torrent download any music. I would build up my Totally Awesome DJ Collection one record at a time, learning Mad DJ Skillz with each new acquisition. Because vinyl records.

As a direct consequence, my general knowledge and understanding of gabber and hardcore techno remained extremely limited. Specifically, what I knew of gabber and hardcore was mostly on the relatively few vinyl records in my collection, which usually got listened to while actually DJing in my bedroom — in other words, only two thirds of each record would actually be heard, since the rest of them had to be cued up. On the other hand, I had an unsurpassed knowledge of all the first 32 bars of some bangin’ electronic tunes.

As a mid-20-something on my first full-time income, any lack of common sense was made up for with boundless belief and enthusiasm. And since I actually owned releases by at least three of the people on the bill, I felt I had totally found my calling.

Why was it so great and memorable?

It’s a terribly clichéd pursuit in post-show accounts to rattle off DJ names and smother each one with slightly different but otherwise indistinguishable dollops of saccharine adulation. Instead, I’ll list the acts I had looked forward to seeing and explain what was truly great about each one.

PaulBlackout

Yes, PaulBlackout is apparently the correct spelling (as compared to Paul Blackout).

He plays heavy and dark drum n’ bass — and at this gig it was like nothing I’d ever heard before. I’d never been to a drum n’ bass night, let alone a hardcore techno gabber night, and here was a guy who played the former while not shying away from the latter.

It was on this occasion that I discovered that drum n’ bass — when it’s good — is wonderful owing to the fact that it’s bizarrely accessible. If you want to dance, anyone can move at whatever speed works for them — and if you add an entire new level of crashing heaviness on top of it is becomes music that anyone can headbang and mosh to, at whatever speed works for them. I’m a metal head at heart (and so is Paul apparently) and this was unequivocally an immensely heavy set.

Incidentally, I love the Desolate Ways EP, especially the monster first track.

Mark N (i.e. Mark Newlands)

Mark happened to be the person that sold me most of my vinyl and I can genuinely say that, if asked, I never got a bad recommendation. I’d seen him play two or three times prior and came to realise that no two sets were ever the same.

What got played was what someone else at a later and unrelated show once described (are you following me?) as “the definition of breakcore”. No doubt Mark would cringe at such an epithet (and possibly say something acerbic), so allow me to clarify first.

The conversation I’m referring to occurred on another occasion with someone I met, at another venue, after a breakcore gig at which Mark happened it play. At one time, after talking about music we liked, this person mentioned how breakcore at its best was when everything got thrown into one ugly mix — techno, drum n’ bass, hip hop, pop mashups, ‘humorous’ samples, turntablism, and everything else.

And that is what got played. Savage, dark and heavy drum n’ bass one moment, rave-speed hip hop the next, dropped on top of something filthy and nasty and terrible doing near 190bpm if not more, and many other things in between.

The DJ Producer

Up until I attended this gig, most of the industrial music I’d seen played out relied heavily on the audience knowing how and when everything went together. These 4 on the floor dance tunes generally had a start, a middle bit, and something at the end to tell you what to do next. Not so with the DJ Producer.

It was hard. It was fast. It was intense, crazy, and it took heavy music to a whole new depth I never realised could be reached. There were breaks, there were thunderous passages of fist-bashing techno, there were moments where it was toned down just long enough to let you catch your breath, before it resumed once more at full attack speed.

This was electronic music and it was heavy like I’d never known. And when it was over I clapped and cheered with the rest of the audience, breathless and sweating from such a roaring set. I was overjoyed that I’d found something that spoke to me so darkly, yet I was also saddened, for “heavy” for me would never quite be the same.

So this is what this music is really about, I thought.

Then some time afterwards, I was told, on good authority, that the DJ Producer’s set was comparatively tame.

Wow.

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Awesome club moment #1 | That time the entire club danced to Skinny Puppy

If you love EBM and industrial music then chances are that at some time you either have or even continue to frequent clubs.

Clubbing — paying cash to enter a licensed venue where people dance, party, drink and sometimes even talk — is pure indulgence at its glorious best. Your eyes get a sensual treat. If you’re into the music, so do your ears. It’s hedonism, adventure, debauchery and gratification all in one. And, you know, you’re young and cool.

On the other hand, it’s not like your health improves. Your finances take a battering. Staying up late and waking up tired doesn’t help your weekend (no wait, you’re still young and cool). And then for some there’s the whole finding oneself and searching for an identity, a phenomenon so prevalent in fringe counter-cultures — but that’s a discussion for another time.

There is of course nothing wrong with the gratifying pursuit of pleasure. It’s just that, as time goes on, all those late nights in dark rooms begin to blur. One can drink and dance and party but it’s the memories that matter. As Lemmy Kilmister once said: “All men are equal when their memory fades”. And as time progresses, they grow just that little more distant.

And yet, sometimes something from the club-days occurs that’s brilliant and memorable enough to stick with you. Like…

#1: That time the entire club danced to Skinny Puppy.

Not the actual club described here. The Das Bunker crowd was presumably more likely to dance to Skinny Puppy.

Call me jaded, but depending on the night there was a time when playing industrial music in small, dark, sweaty venues meant getting accustomed to seeing a great many of people — usually sitting down and standing by the side of the room and not dancing.

One could dedicate an entire study to the gothic paradox, whereby dressing up makes one feel fundamentally confident and dark and foreboding and shockingly anti-conformist on the crowded 11:55pm train into the city — yet somehow one feels uncomfortable about stepping out onto an empty dancefloor in front of one’s peers.

Whatever the cause (apathy? shyness? not wanting to be the first? the impracticality of an impossibly complex outfit?) the greatest dilemma for DJs at certain times once involved what to do with all that fantastic and new-but-as-yet-unheard music.

It was the age-old dilemma: play it safe and familiar, and risk condemnation for nauseating repetition or try something new and unprecedented, and risk emptying the dancefloor like draining bathwater (I personally witnessed this to spectacular effect when I thought I was being all progressive-like when I was the first to drop the Apoptygma Berserk version of Cambodia… they practically ran off the dancefloor).

It was the well-known spectre of keeping all the people happy some of the time, and some of the people happy all the time, but never all the people all the time.

Yet one evening the truly fantastical happened when an entire club got up to dance — to one track. It was Skinny Puppy (or rather, a Skinny Puppy cover) and for one fleeting, glorious moment, the whole damn club became everything that people who don’t go to clubs imagined it to be.

I might add that this was at a venue that was, in every sense of the word, underground. This was the Bunker Lounge, a windowless, single-room, shoebox-shaped subterranean cavity on Swanston Street. Entering first necessitated descending down stairs, whereupon one emerged into the secret space below. Seriously, industrial AF!

While a well-known track traditionally incites a portion of the room to stop what they’re doing and hopefully get up and move, at this precise moment there was something about the crowd, the vibe, the timing and whatever else that, quite simply, balanced out for there to something in it for everyone in the room.

Worth getting for the Skinny Puppy cover of Assimilated.

The track that made it happen was a Skinny Puppy cover — Assimilate by Malaise. In the chronological sense it was not new, being several years old at the time. It was, however, new in that it was uncommon to hear it get played.

Within moments of it kicking off, not one person remained seated as the whole room was up and jumping. In popular vanilla culture, when those CSI and NCIS agents investigate a crime from the seedy underground and they enter one of those dangerous alternative places, the mandatory scene that greets them is something out of Dante’s fetish party. Of course everyone is dancing, gyrating, leering viciously. And to totally emphasise just how sinister the whole shindig is, the music is usually some vanilla interpretation of whatever the TV producer felt would be a good match for non-conformist music (sometimes it’s even Marilyn Manson, assuming the studio could afford the licencing).

Industrial EBM goth-type club-goers know that the above scene is rarely a thing. But for one glorious moment, it was. Nor was a Triple J ‘alternative’ selection or cheesy ’80s pop track. It was Skinny Puppy (sort of).

And the rivet heads shed a silent tear.
                 

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Winter Solstice Damnation III | Gigs I should have said something about at the time

There’s this thing that I do when I’m at gigs. I’m getting into it, enjoying the show, and then a few songs into a set I take a photo on my phone. I don’t take many photos, mind you, just a couple of quick shots in succession (because I’m not a homicide-inducing wanker who repeatedly blocks your view with a phone when I’m at a gig). A few seconds later, and with the shots finished, I approvingly assure myself that I’m totally going to blog about this night in the near future.

Except, life and all its tiredness and distractions and mundanity get in the way. Before I know it, I’m at another gig, taking more shots, telling myself the same thing. Then life gets in the way yet again. Eventually, I end up with a phone full of gig photos. And as everyone knows, if it’s not on the internet, it didn’t happen, right?

I do this so often that I finally decided to do something about it, so I started a series of posts very imaginatively called Gigs I should have said something about at the time. Mostly it’s me posting photos from a year or six ago or even more. So this time I’m going to post about a very recent gig — in fact, it took place just last Saturday. Hahaha, who am I kidding? That was when I wrote the draft. This was totally a month ago now.

That makes it one of those Gigs I should have said something about at the time — and totally did this time. Well, kind of. That gig was…

Winter Solstice Damnation III at The Tote, June 24, 2017

As the name implies Winter Solstice Damnation is an annual celebration of bands across the spectrum of black, death, blackened thrash, and other assortments of extreme heavy metal sounds lovingly described in terms like dark and putrid and frostbitten.

Held once a year near the Winter Solstice (like, just in case that part wasn’t clear), it draws in a marvellous assortment of local and interstate bands play this style of music.

Before I progress further, I must concede that I did not make it to the venue until quite late in the evening. Remember what I said about life and all its tiredness and distractions and mundanity getting in the way? So, regrettably, I only caught the last three performances.

Dead River Runs Dry

The first of these (the sixth on the bill) was Dead River Runs Dry, out of NSW. My first exposure to Dead River Runs Dry was a year or so earlier, via a rather good track, Skull Of The Wind, on a Terrorizer magazine CD compilation. It’s an excellent starting point from an outfit that plays what (for lack of a better description) might best be referred as something akin to orthodox black metal, with some soaring hooks and epic melodies thrown in.

Kudos also to their vocalist who played the whole set both shirtless and shoeless. As the “Winter Solstice” part of the festival’s name makes clear, this event occurs on the longest and darkest night of the year. This is Melbourne folks — to put things in perspective, I had to don my thick winter gloves just to actually be able to hold my pint in the beer garden. On the other hand, perhaps this was counteracted by the fact that all members of Dead River Runs Dry were blessed with beards? A good volume of facial hair no doubt helps contribute to maintaining core body temperature — and as a bonus, did you know it acts as a passive sun block?

• Dead River Runs Dry Bandcamp

AK-11

Melbourne’s AK-11 were next up — and they must surely get the award for best outfits. Words are likely inadequate to convey the effort that went into the attire and its stark effect, so the grainy still below (original video via CoveOfQueenSalma - check out some nice footage of the event).

Here was fast, nasty, vitriolic black metal that felt like it was played with a dose of snarly punk attitude, except that the name of the game was hatred and misanthropy.

But… those outfits… if I am not mistaken, that was an Austrian pattern, minus sleeves, matched with DIY corpse paint. Incredibly, the cammo pattern and corpse paint, not to mention front-man Valak’s impressive tattoo sleeves, blended in uncannily well.

• AK-11 Bandcamp

 Ignivomous

Finally it was the headliner’s turn: Ignivomous.

How to describe the bleak death metal darkness that is this band? What is the sound of a group that doesn’t even pretend to venture close to this thing that vanilla folks term “accessible”? If extreme music is meant to be unrelenting and merciless and uncompromisingly bleak and overwhelming in every way then Ignivomous tick every box.

Yet in that beer garden, before they got on stage, I witnessed one chap express his sincere joy and appreciation at finally being able to see Ignivomous live.

“I’ve been waiting 10 years to see you guys,” he said. It turns out he was a long-time fan who lived in the sticks so he’d never gotten around to seeing a live Ignivomous show.

From listening in to this conversation I was once more reminded that one should not judge someone’s character based purely on appearances. This chap wasn’t even wearing a black t-shirt — it was white! — yet here was quite possibly the most devout Ignivomous fan in the room.

A few tracks into the band’s barrage — yes, barrage is a term that gets thrown in far too often, but “set” underrated the aural blindness down the front, as I was — it was revealed that this gig would mark 10 years since Ignivomous formed — and that it would also be guitarist Matt’s last official show with the band. To mark the occasion they even dug into the very early demo days.

After, when it was all done, I was reminded that “ignivomous” is a no-longer-used term to describe the act of vomiting fire. If one had to pick a soundtrack to accompany such an indescribably extreme phenomenon, that would likely be it.

• Ignivomous Bandcamp on Nuclear War Now (note, the download and merch page links seem to be temporarily down).

A final word

No, the Tote was not packed to capacity that night, yet the turnout was Aussie-decent, given the prevailing winter conditions. Plus, it was reassuring to see the beer garden less than full during actual performances.

I will never cease to consider myself fortunate — and neither should you — for as long as this phenomenon we call the ‘scene’ continues to exist in Melbourne.

Every other week there is an event that involves usually (but not always) black-clad, usually (but not always) long-haired people getting up on stages and (yes, always) making one hell of a racket as they play dark, nasty, messed up noise.

Whatever the merits of individual bands, it is a privilege to know that the forces of darkness are not going away any time soon.

Korn: Issues - the whine of a generation

You know when you come across a release or a track that you think isn’t quite as bad as everyone had led you to believe — if only it weren’t for that one jarring, inescapable, overpowering element that’s disproportionately responsible for spoiling the whole damn thing?

That’s what Korn is.

Contrary to popular belief, the much-maligned, commercially successful, despised ikons of nu metal, would actually rate as moderately listenable — if only it weren’t for that one overwhelmingly crap quality that persisted in achieving the very opposite. What could it be?

The cover says $2 but I only paid 1$. Winning!

My first encounter with Korn was somewhere in early 1997 (Christ, has it been that long…!) through a mate’s dubbed copy of Korn album #2, Life Is Peachy. From the opening salvo of the intro, it was immediately noticeable. There was that unmistakeable Korn-trademark animalistic / acapella / growling intro that was track 1, Twist. The rest of the album was heavy metal, but not as we know it. It was edgy, atonal, big on the bottom end (or at least as much as you could be on a second or third-generation dub), yet many of the tracks merged into an indistinguishable brown soup of one-ness (although the cover of Ice Cube’s Wicked was kind of memorable).

Life Is Peachy didn’t blow me away and Korn, with few exceptions, did not feature much in my life. Sure, I heard a disproportionately high volume of Korn hits at alt and goth clubs (for which I even purchased a subsequently barely-used Greatest Hits Vol. 1 copy, since I assumed I’d DJ the pants off it); and on at least two occasions I even heard a momentarily smattering of a Korn performance from a great distance at major music festivals while passing between stages. But other than that, I barely paid any attention to Korn for the next 20 years.

Then, not too long ago, I came across a copy of Korn: Issues for the bargainous sum of 1$ at an op shop. Was it worth another try, I wondered?

My preferred method for determining whether something has provided me with sufficient value for money is the “dollar per wear” method. An adage from an older generation that says you successfully justified your consumer spend if you shelled out $20 on something worn 20 times, by this logic my copy of Korn: Issues would be a successful investment even if it failed to elicit any interest after just one full listen.

Issues was Korn’s fourth album, released late 1999. It appeared right after Korn had gotten really big off the back of album #3, Follow The Leader, along with tremendous exposure through the Family Values Tour where they performed with Ice Cube, Orgy, Limp Bizkit and… Rammstein

Hugely anticipated at the time — unless you despised nu metal — Korn: Issues actually contains some decent riffs and quality passages. The problem, unfortunately, is that they're near impossible to appreciate.

Important liner notes.

With Issues, the Korn sound had mellowed, or softened (or sold out), depending on who you ask. They’d focussed more on the song-writing rather than being all atonal and in your face, and had substantial record label support propelling them in this chosen new direction.

Here was a heavy metal group (just accept it) that had started life with a unique and heavy blend of noise rock-inspired heavy metal, with guitar solos substituted by a mixed bag of borrowed hip hop and other genres. By the fourth album, and with commercial success on their heels, the jaggedness had been smoothed out, and the Korn sound had evolved into something closer to a hard rock album rather than the disjointed noise affair of the early days. And all that refinement on Issues would have resulted in a not-entirely-deplorable album if it weren’t for one quality that makes this recording so diabolically difficult to return to: vocalist Johnathan Davis’ incessant whining!

More profound liner notes.

If there’s one rally point that nu metal detractors scorn above all others, it’s the whining, moaning, woe-is-me, vocal style of nu metal singers. Be it Slipknot, Limp Bizkit, Linkin Park, Mushroomhead, Orgy, or whoever, nothing characterises what is most disliked about nu metal more than the whining. But you just wouldn’t understand, right?

On Issues, no amount of production and song-crafting can hide or compensate for the annoyance induced by that vocals whinge — a shame, because it totally detracts from two otherwise decent album qualities.

The four alternative covers were an interesting idea.
Maybe they should have done four alternative mixes too?

Firstly, it obscures quite a few interestingly-produced and relatively ‘minimal’ passages. Like a hip-hop album, where less can be better, Issues has some diverse moments that rely on effects, sound and subtle mood over chugging riffs. While we get small touches of this on the openings to tracks like 4 U and Falling Away From Me, it seems the album is ultimately most concerned with plugging any possible vocal-free leaks with maximum whinging.

Secondly, it does the same for when the opposite occurs — that is, we get the same moaning right just when we’re hoping to get a good riff going.

In other words, Issues is an album that could have been an interesting if not outstanding composite of harsh and light, merging hard moments of head banging mosh power with lighter, thinking person’s CTFD passages, ultimately offering a respectable and matured if inevitably more mellowed and lighter alternative to all that chugga-chugga.

Alas, on this album Korn are obsessed with filling every available moment with Davis’ whining.

I tried with Issues, I really did, but it reminded me of why I never got into Korn. If you still don’t believe me, check out the track It’s Gonna Go Away. With a mere 1:30 duration it’s barely an interlude. When first conceived it may have had the trappings of a good, minimal contemplative type of track, the kind of thing to get you to pause before resuming with the next monster riff — instead, it's literally one and a half minutes of whining. Listen to it for yourself.

At a dollar a play, I got my money’s worth, seven or eight times over.

So that’s why I never got that much into Korn. 

Nightwish at the Forum Theatre | Awesome gigs I should have said something about at the time

The best movies, the best social catch-ups, and commonly the best gigs are often the ones we attend with zero expectations — “zero expectations” here meaning exactly that: no expectations of any sort, as compared to expectations that are low or high.

So it was with precisely zero expectations that I found myself seeing Nightwish at extremely short notice, at Melbourne’s Forum Theatre. This was on January 11, 2016 — exactly one year ago — and in the tradition of unexpected things, I rate it as one of the best ‘unplanned’ (sort of) gigs I’ve ever been to, especially since at the time I didn’t own a single item from the Nightwish discography.

The backstory to this awesome-gig-I-should-have-said-something-about-at-the-time involved lots of uhming and ahing on my part. I had given serious consideration to seeing them with a friend but unfortunately I put off getting a ticket until after discovering it had sold out. Said friend — to whom I cannot emphasise strongly enough how eternally grateful I will forever be — ended up not being able to go at the last moment and kindly provided me with her ticket. The result is best described as that bitter sweet phenomenon where you check out a band whose music you don’t actively follow but you still know who they are, and then you discover how brilliant they are live but it’s bitter sweet because you wished you’d gotten into them sooner.

The classic style of the Forum Theatre in Melbourne was so very appropriate.

I recommend you check out Nightwish live if, like me, you happen to know who Nightwish are but either don’t know their music well or only know their top 40. It will all make sense on the stage, how all that flamboyance and grandiose symphonic style transformed a heavy metal group from a small town in Finland into the country’s biggest music export.

However, almost as epic as the degree of commercial success of Nightwish is the level of drama and controversy. Founded in 1996, Nightwish (very publicly) fired their first two vocalists under very acrimonious (and again, very public) circumstances. But that didn’t detract from the superbness of this show.

From the moment they opened with Shudder Before The Beautiful from then-still-most-recent-Nightwish-album Endless Forms Most Beautiful it was clear that this show would be quite something. Nightwish singer 3.0 Floor Jansen’s soaring voice is out of this world-grade brilliant, and the general sound quality — something you value highly when you’ve been to enough gigs with terrible sound — was excellent.

There were further surprises for a first-timer like me. I discovered that bassist Marco Hietala has an incredible voice, as heard in his backup vocals and one or two tracks on which he sang lead. Marco is obviously not the primary singer but he is, to quote a friend, “a proper power metal vocalist with his own other band”.

Floor Jansen's voice is just killer.

The most pleasing discovery would have to be Uilleann pipes man Troy Donockley, now a permanent member. The stand-out was the epically magnificent pipe solo on the track I Want My Tears Back, because there's something diabolically catchy about pipes, let alone Uilleann pipes, played by one of the very best.

Less impressive was the fact that Floor Jansen seemed to disappear through the back of the stage every five minutes. Whether this was because she was required to fix her makeup, wipe off the sweat, or ensure that main-man Tuomas Holopainen wasn’t getting upstaged by her presence, I will never know.

Indeed, Nightwish detractors like to point out that Nightwish — or rather Tuomas Holopainen, being the primary composer — disappeared up Nightwish’s ass some years ago. To paraphrase the same friend from before, Nightwish used to be a ‘proper’ metal band with distinct riffs and solos, but are now more concerned with drowning everything except for vocals in layers of studio production.

I don’t full agree with this notion but I can tell you that this gig led directly to me buying my first Nightwish album, Imaginaerum — which I found very disappointing.
Yes, I get that it’s an indulgent concept album, but save for three chorus-soaring epic singalongs — Storytime, the previously mentioned I Want My Tears Back, and giant concert closer Last Ride Of The Day — I found Imaginaerum didn’t stand up to long-term listening. But for those three brilliant corkers, I found Imaginaerum sooo dull, none more so than on the 13:38-long Song For Myself.

Guess which ones are the best.

However, none of this came through during the gig. Yeah, there were a few moments that the hard-and-fast heavy metal lover in me found a bit snoozey, but otherwise it was a superb live show, and anyone who wasn’t smiling their arses off by the end was either comatose or deceased.

Nightwish are a first-rate live act and this came through as clearly as possible at this sold out Australian show.

The sound at the Forum was excellent too.

As I said, this gig was approached with zero expectations, and it turned out to be great. I will definitely try to catch them live again, although the degree of expectation this time will obviously be different. Knowing what I experienced, those high expectations will hopefully be well-founded. Just as long as Tuomas and the rest of Nightwish keep their egos in check (or aren’t allegedly taken out of context when purportedly dissing other bands). Then there those comments about Floor Jansen being “the last” Nightwish vocalist.

Seeing as their track record with retaining vocalists ain’t that great, let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.

You haven’t lived until you see a Manowar tribute band at a dodgy venue with a cockroach problem

A Manowar cover band – yes, that got your attention – playing through a malfunctioning sound system at a small dive bar with an alleged cockroach problem.

It wasn’t quite the strangest gig I’d ever been to, but it certainly was peculiar ones. For one thing, did someone say Manowar cover band?

The Triumph Of Steel, Melbourne, November 5, 2016 @ Whole Lotta Love.

Yes. They’re called The Triumph Of Steel and you should definitely see them live.

Consider how much Manowar are the gigantic anti-hipster hipsters of heavy metal. More metal than any metal that ever metalled in Metalville on plant Metal, Manowar are so densely absorbed into everything Manowar — with everything they do being so jaw-droppingly, cringe-inducingly, they-can’t-be serious-grade uncool — that to be serious about liking Manowar seriously is inherently cool.

Don’t get me wrong, I love Manowar, particularly the first half a dozen or so albums in the Manowar discography. It’s just that, if Manowar managed to convey even the tiniest sliver of tongue-in-cheek irony, people would probably be less inclined to believe that Manowar had long, long, long since disappeared up their own arses. Alas, non-seriousness with Manowar there just ain’t. Disregarding the unbelievably homo-erotic band promo shots from their earlier era, the true silliness of what Manowar became is evident in, for example, in printing all lyrics for an entire album in genuinely illegible faux-runes, thereby defeating the purpose of providing lyrics in the first place. Or maybe it started with the line of Manowar Warrior Shield condoms?

From their sixth or so album onwards, Manowar didn’t just jump the shark – they swam some laps together, hung out at the bar afterwards and became best of friends. Consequently, as far as the Manowar of today goes, the Manowar vision of what constitutes heavy metal is single-mindedly inflexible.

Which of course means that The Triumph Of Steel aren’t just any old cover band. They’re a Manowar cover band – and faithfully mimicking a band that morphed into a parody of itself takes a very special kind of wheel on fire.

Thankfully, the Triumph Of Steel were wonderful when I saw them on November 5, 2016 at a little bar called Whole Lotta Love. They put on a good show and did not lack dedication, a feat that is even more notable considering their technical and pest-related (more on this shortly) challenges.

Vocalist Igor’s melodic voice was outstanding. Indeed, merely being a good power-melodic vocalist isn’t easy, but only the leatheriest chaps can properly pay direct homage to Manowar vocalist Eric Adams takes. Filtered through his rich accent, it would have made for a captivating show — were it not for the poor old malfunctioning PA.

"Faaahiiighting, faaahiiighting, fighting the world!"

Through absolutely no fault of their own (I was informed by what I was assured was a reliable source) the house PA was just not playing ball. While the guitar came through ok, the vocals jumped between excessive quietness or cut in and out, possibly because of a loose connection. It wasn’t too bad from the bar and beyond, but it was excruciating at the front of the small stage where I wanted to stand. My gig compadre pointed out that the band were in all likelihood oblivious to what was going out the front. This was probably a good thing as it would have been a shame to see them thrown by somethign that wasn't their doing.

Towards the end of the set, enough beer had been consumed, or perhaps the track selection struck the right power chord (or perhaps a combination of both) that the men at the front (and they were all men) of the stage really got into it. Fighting The World material, it seems, holds a special place for Melbourne heavy metal lovers.

And so The Triumph Of Steel finished their set, to an audience that was small but sincerely appreciative, for the power and the glory and the singalong choruses. When it comes to heavy metal, Manowar are one-of-a-kind, and this Manowar cover band played their role faithfully.

Gig compadre and I stayed back for a drink or two where we had a bit of a chat to guitarist David, who seemed like a nice chap. Last drinks were called and then… cockroaches.

Or to be perfectly honest – one big cockroach, casually making its way across the dance floor. I pointed this out to the reliable source mentioned at the start of this story, who responded by saying that the venue had, apparently, quite recently enlisted the service of a pest controller — but then the joke was that said professional must have missed a spot.

A week or so after the gig I found myself hanging out with a friend, where I casually mentioned this peculiar evening. She mentioned how she’d once ended up there with the intention of enjoying a quiet drink. It was an uneventful night, said the friend (who — and this will become relevant in a moment — is what you’d call small-statured), until she went to the bar and noticed how she rather stood out from the other patrons. She was dwarfed by the great many enormous people all throughout the room who, it turns out, were there to enjoy the dedicated BBW night that was regularly held at the venue.

What a strange thing it is. But actually, it’s just another great night out in Melbourne. I love live music and events in this city and I wouldn’t swap it for anything.

A pox on phones at concerts (and how to stop them)

I went to a fantastic gig the other week. L7, back in action after 13 years of inactivity (ok, so they got back together in 2014, but you get what I mean), and live in concert for the first time in Australia since 1998 .

You can read below about how good they were, how tight they sounded, and how the show was just excellent. Unfortunately, part of this otherwise-great gig was soured by an all-too-common problem.

This L7 concert was a sold-out and therefore crowded occasion. I was situated in a sort of ok-but-not-perfect-spot near the side of the stage. The spot itself was not a problem. In fact, even with a support pillar in the way, the view was moderately good — except for the 20 per cent of the time when that view was interrupted by someone's illuminated phone screen.

If you’ve been attending gigs for the last 10 or so years you’ll be well-versed with this raging pain in the arse phenomenon. The Shovel got it right with its story title man forced to watch concert through his own eyes after mistakenly leaving phone at home.

Phones at concerts. A thousand plagues upon them.

To clarify: there is nothing wrong with taking a quick photo or five at a gig that you love. I can even stomach a quick little video. The problem — at least for anyone with the audacity to not be fixated on their phone — is the overpowering volume of people who repeatedly pull out phones (or God forbid, an ipad) and spend half their time not-looking at the performance they’ve paid to attend.

I wish I could say it was a so-called Millennial disease, that it was I who was unnecessarily grumpy because of some generation gap. That was not the case at L7, however, for the person in front of me, hyper-focussing on the stage through a small backlit phone screen, was definitely not younger than myself.

A thousand plagues upon them. It’s a chronic problem that spoils gigs. Yet saddest part of all is that phone obsessives sometimes literally don’t realise what they’re missing, something I saw first-hand during the last Iron Maiden tour.

If any heavy metal band has a world-class stage show, it is Maiden. To see my favourite band, I had purchased floor tickets, where I found my view constantly blocked by the young chap in front of me — or rather, blocked by his large-screen phone that went up during and between and after each song.

Towards the end of the set there’s a brief lull where the lights go down. This precedes the song The Number Of The Beast, but before the Woe to you,o earth and sea bit comes on, something extraordinary occurs on the otherwise dark stage. As you look up, a faint grey figure begins to materialise. Initially not quite clear as your eyes adjust, it transforms into an amazing sight, as you realise you’re looking at a gigantic satanic figure, towering maybe 20m high and leering at you from the darkness.

It’s an unbelievable, awe-inspiring, unforgettable piece of stage-craft. Its purpose is to build tension as it introduces one of the most famous heavy metal songs of all time. And all this occurs while you're at a concert for one of the greatest heavy metal bands of all time.
You’d think all eyes would be fixed on what was going on ahead of them. Yet it was painfully obvious that this young chap, blocking my view with his large phone, had missed the whole thing. Why? Because he’d evidently decided that this ‘interlude’ was a good time to capture a wide-angled panoramic shot of the arena. To do this you need to firmly hold your phone and pivot in a slow circle, steadily pointing your device at the seated audience — and therefore look in all directions but the stage. By the time he was done, he’d completely missed the entire giant-Satan-appearing-out-of-the-darkness thing. He was clearly oblivious to what he’d just managed to not see at this event he’d paid good money to attend (Iron Maiden concert tickets are not cheap). I suppose he at least got a good photo of the crowd, right?

So what is to be done?

• Perhaps bands can sell two categories of tickets: one at the regular price, titled GENERAL ADMISSION WITH PHONE CAMERA, and a second category, going slightly cheaper, titled GENERAL ADMISSION FOR PEOPLE WHO ACTUALLY WANT TO SEE THE GIG.

• Maybe bands or venue staff can hand out pieces of cardboard with PUT THE FUCKING PHONE AWAY printed in large letters. Not sure if the insurance would cover the additional violence though.

• Or perhaps bands can do what GWAR are famous for doing at concerts — saturating the first 15 rows of the audience with fake blood. It might only stop the first 15 rows from interfering with the show, but if you’re that close to the stage, being covered in gallons of fake blood is an excellent trade-off for a phone-free view of the performance.

Phones are the bane of modern gigs. A thousand plagues upon them.

How would you fix it?

L7 were great

I had the privilege of seeing L7 the other week. It was the first gig (the sold out one) of their two-date Melbourne leg — and would you believe, I’d forgotten I’d even bought a ticket until a week before the show. Only when an automated reminder materialised in my inbox did I realise I had committed, so for once it’s actually a case of thanks corporate-ticketing-company.

And you know what? It ain’t the first time it happened. My fears of early onset Alzheimer’s, however, are a discussion for another time. What were we talking about? See what I did there?

L7 live. Pic: Mik Thornley.

My love for L7 began when I was 12 or 13, when I played virtually to destruction a dubbed cassette of Bricks Are Heavy. I loved it from the first listen — the heavier tracks anyway — and how it merged the cynically tone of punk with the heaviness of metal, while substituting watered down whining, found in so much of the grunge that was so big at the time, with actual attitude.

About 20 years later I came across my second L7 album, Hungry For Stink. It was the odd one out in this 200-CD lot of grindcore, death and black metal — someone’s former collection — that I picked up in one go from a pawn shop.

Here was a massive and (for me) unprecedented collection of extreme music, an intense concentration of the heaviest, fastest and grimmest music on earth — and yet Hungry For Stink was one of the stand-outs from the whole lot. As with Bricks Are Heavy, there was just something about the attitude, the acerbic vocals, and those giant riffs.

Naturally, it was great to finally seem them live, this occasion being the previously mentioned first of two shows at 170 Russell aka Billboard, what with the first one having sold out.

Within one song, it was immediately apparent how tight L7 they were on stage. These women started rocking out 30 years ago, and while they had something of an extended break in the latter half,  in close to two decades of rocking hard they’ve clearly run low on neither fuel nor fire. Incidentally, check out this unbelievable 1992 Australian tour itinerary where they played venues ranging from The Palace to Monash University. When did international acts stop doing this?

Fuel my fire! Pic: Mik Thornley.

The fact that the sound was excellent did not detract from the show. Is that a non sequitur? Probably. But then I’ve been to at least one gig at 170 Russell where the audio was rubbish.

Track selection was predictably pleasing. L7 have not released new material in 17 years so the setlist borrowed heavily from Bricks Are Heavy and Hungry For Stink — and nobody was complaining. Crowd favourite Fuel My Fire went off with its sawing groove, as did the other rockers like Pretend We’re Dead, Monster, Shitlist (I never got that one much, as I always thought it was a bit wimpy — instead of getting a pen to “write out a list” why not just destroy your enemies and everything they love?) and so forth. My personal favourite L7 song, One More Thing, was the highlight. Goddamn do I love that track so hard with its slow tempo and low-end riff.

Talking of One More Thing, it provided one of the rare opportunities where frontwoman Donita Sparks spoke to the audience — a gag about the lyric line “there’s nothing fun to do tonight” that which morphed into a reference to what the band were doing after the gig. Get it? Doing something fun tonight? Incidentally, the planned activities amounted to “we’re going to dance our asses off” at the after party.

Wait a moment... this isn't the Hawkwind gig. Pic: Mik Thornley. Wacky Photoshopping: me.

I would have liked to see more banter between songs, or at least something resembling dialogue. There was no faulting the tight guitar-ing and everything else, but a top gig could have been just that little bit better-er if there’d been just a touch more interaction. But that’s an exceedingly minor criticism.

I did have one more serious complaint about this L7 concert — but it has nothing to do with L7.

Goddamn phones. That story coming soon...

Denouncement Pyre launch Black Sun Unbound at the Bendigo Hotel - and I didn't feel too old

Does heavy metal truly flow in your blood? If the answer is yes then I choose to believe that the fire never leaves you, no matter your age. What changes when you’re at a gig is what I like to think of as a case of things getting more efficient — that raging open wood blaze that burnt so brightly and unpredictably is now one of those modern, efficient, possibly quieter but definitely more reliable gas heaters.

There comes a point — usually in what is considered the ‘middle’ part of life — where the wild expectations of seeing a live band are tempered by the begrudging realisation that this dying meatbag body you inhabit isn’t quite as sturdy as it used to be.

I’ve been warned many times not to get old. Especially on Friday nights, when all you can think of at the end of your five-day 9-5 working stiff routine is how nice it would be to block out reality by inching just a bit closer to finally Netflixing all 178 episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation.

Yet here I was, on a Friday night, still getting older, but defiantly getting ready for a gig, because I love heavy metal and I love this art form called extreme music.

The occasions was Melbourne’s Denouncement Pyre, who were launching their recently released new album, Black Sun Unbound. The location was that reliable pedestal of a venue that will put on extreme music where other venues won’t: the Bendigo Hotel. I’ve written about Denouncement Pyre before because they put on a great show, and also because I strongly suspect they’re close to being (or might actually be) the band I’ve seen live more than any other. Indeed, I’ve seen Iron Maiden seven times and The Night Terrors on a comparable number of occasions, but I can’t recall the number of Denouncement Pyre live performances I’ve accumulated.

Denouncement Pyre. Pic: Ashleigh Duncan.

As you get older, you tend to get more chilled when it comes to those things that years ago might have caused some existential anxiety. Or, if a younger me was somehow able to address an older me, I might find it amusing to say that you simply have less f***s to give.

On the other hand, you also find yourself in a situation where you need to duck out because you could really do with a coffee before the main act takes onto the stage.

But more on that later.

Denouncement Pyre are one of those bands who seem to get just that little bit better each time. Despite the fact that I cannot play a musical instrument (in my defence, I’m exceptionally good at listening to music), it’s clear that they have ammunition-carrier-loads of technical proficiency and the dedication to drive it. The gig was also an occasion to see Tasmania’s Ruins, who I didn’t know much about but sounded promising.

But back to getting old…

Does heavy metal truly flow in your blood? If the answer is yes then I choose to believe that the fire never leaves you, no matter your age. What changes when you’re at a gig is what I like to think of as a case of things getting more efficient — that raging open wood blaze that burnt so brightly and unpredictably is now one of those modern, efficient, possibly quieter but definitely more reliable gas heaters. Yes, a gas fire is nowhere near as awesome as a raging wood fire, but they’re equally effective and the end result is just the same. And besides, Victorian smoking regulations mean it’s way harder to come home with a jacket reeking of cigarette smoke.

Subjecting your body to lethal doses of beer like you did back in the day would now also mean writing off most of the next day (and apparently, once you add another decade, there’s also all of Sunday to take off). So you tend to get a bit more selective and try to make the most of it.

Assuming you have a stable income, you also worry less about the getting to and from. Back in my day, when you tied an onion to your belt, which was the style at the time, you also had to think about funds. Having less of them generally meant choosing between getting home and getting one last drink. While meeting new and interesting people on the NightRider home did make for memorable encounters, the novelty soon wore off.

It’s a cruel twist of fate, isn’t it? That in order to have the freedom to not worry about being strictly responsible you need to live your life somewhat strictly and responsibly so as to not have to worry about losing all that freedom.

And finally, one last benefit, at least in my situation, is that, generally speaking, there’s hopefully less worry about your place in the world. Figuring out this thing we call identity for many people on both sides of their twenties is a work in progress, but add another 10 years and you’re less likely to carry on in a way that doesn’t resemble the real you.

Of course, I’d be lying if I said I didn’t sometimes get fleeting moments of anxiety — and then I remember that I’m here to see a talented band play a variety of music that I love and that I’m privileged to live in a city where this is a regular occurrence.

Quite a line-up.

To wit, the pre-gig grown-up-grade (so not McDonald’s) dinner that my gig-going counterpart and I began with was at the magnificent Mrs Parma’s. Apart from the innuenduous title, they have a first-rate albeit-higher-than-average-priced selection of craft beers and the Mexican parma is simply superb. Beware though, for if you’re not accustomed to chilies, you may end up paying for it the next morning (what was that about getting old)?

Upon arriving at The Bendigo Hotel I sadly missed the power electronics violation from RuiNation. Though power electronics are typically not my first choice of beverage (I won’t knock it back, it just doesn’t feature prominently in my music collection), I do love the fact that a performance of confrontingly atonal noise music like this opens up a metal gig.

I did, however, catch the tail end of Hordes Of The Black Cross, who finished with a rather savage black thrash number. Perhaps it happened to be one of their best tracks, what with it being a done thing in live music to finish with the good stuff. Or perhaps it was something else? Whatever it was, the sound emanating from the stage was excellent. I’ve been to several Bendigo Hotel shows and I’ve occasionally noticed a muddy character to the audio — but not this time. It might have had something to do with new sound insulation behind the stage, or it might have been due to something else, but either way, every band I saw that night sounded sharp.

This quality helped bring out so much of the fine detail for Ruins. From Tasmania, they play an interesting, very non-linear (non verse-chorus-verse) kind of second wave-ish death-black metal, on the mid-tempo spectrum, more about murk and mire than freezing blasts.

That made perfect sense, right?

One unusual thing – and I say unusual in the context of the three-standard-deviations-away-from-normality that is playing live black and death metal – was Ruins vocalist Alex Pope. On this bill there was no shortage of bullet belts, dark and satanic imagery, splotches of corpse paint – death and black metal tropes, if you like. Yet on this night he had none of those. No corpse paint, bullet belts (that I could see), war chains, gas masks — there was a band shirt though.

In no way am I diminishing the inherent value that all these things add to a metal show — I love it when what you see in a performance matches what you hear — but nonetheless, kudos to him for delivering the same vocal savagery, minus the optional accoutrements.

It seemed to me like a very honest performance, as if I was witnessing the spirit of Aussie pub rock — albeit a damned spirit from the last pub in the abyss. It was a good show, incidentally, and (I think it was the) closing track Suicidal Pulse sounded incredible.

After Ruins finished it was time for me and my gig counterpart’s running joke — namely, how we could really do with a little rest between bands. The running joke started earlier this year when we caught the train into town for Iron Maiden and ended up on quite a detour to acquire a much-needed coffee pep up.

And so on this occasion coffee called us again. Alas, no traditional coffee vendors were open at that late hour in the sort of dodgy end of Collingwood. We did pass one place called Everyday Coffee but we were informed that they only sold fancy cocktails. As an aside, I’m proud of my restraint in not pointing out the name of the venue to the staff member bearing the disappointing news, and therefore not contributing to shaping that individual's poor worldview of the hospitality industry.

Ultimately we settled on petrol station-grade coffee. It was dirt cheap and not too far off from dirt tasting either, but we weren’t consuming it for the flavour and that was fine by us.

After we returned it was time to see Denouncement Pyre.

Denouncement Pyre at the Bendigo Hotel.

Wicked bass. Pic: Ashleigh Duncan. Terrible Photoshop editing: me.

As mentioned, they seem to get a little bit better with each show and each new release. The recognition is growing, with that still-recent performance at Maryland Deathfest 2016 apparently garnering some deserving attention.

It turned out to be an excellent show, but you knew I was going to say that. Although terms like tight, imposing and commanding come to mind, the truth is that it’s difficult to sensibly describe in words what music sounds like — best you go hear and see it for yourself. They played some new tunes from Black Sun Unbound and generally owned the stage — a representative example of what I’ve heard overseas people use the term 'scene' when referring to Aussie blackened thrash.

After the gig I spoke very briefly to Ruins’ Alex Pope over the merch table. I asked for a recommendation on which album from the Ruins discography would be a good start (the table had three to choose from) and he gave me a deal on three albums — and even threw in a patch, which was very nice of him. He also thanked me, very sincerely, “for your support”.

And at that, it was almost time to go home and go to bed.

Well almost.
As the main room was emptying I talked to someone who, unbelievably, wasn’t wearing a black band shirt and didn’t listen to all that much extreme music. We discussed cats and tractors — and let me tell you this: Massey Ferguson is the real deal folks.

It was one of the most interesting conversations I’d had all week. Not to depreciate the value of the other conversations that night or that week, but not just cats AND but ALSO agricultural machinery at a metal gig is a rare combination. Regrettably, it was over all too soon and us oldies had to go home and shuffle into bed in preparation for all those forthcoming adulty responsibilities.

As I made my way home in the back of a cab I figured it had been a very decent night. The gig was well-attended and supported. I had some expensive-ish craft beer over a Mexican parma as well as some normal-priced generic beer, and a dirt-cheap-priced coffee too. I was reminded that this art form called extreme music is alive, well, and routinely commanding a great turnout.

I saw some good music. I met some interesting people. It was an affirmation of the great things about heavy metal. But I still thought the bit about cats and tractors was a memorable highlight.

As I said, you look at things a bit differently as you get older.