Tuesday, December 04, 2012

Hit & Miss


Not particularly hot about attending these two gigs, and definitely not keen on the venue. But the man was keen. Since the gigs didn't begin till after dinner, they wouldn't interrupt anything. Nobody turns up at gigs at 7pm even though that's what the ticket says. Took a jaunt into town to check out two metal-ish bands.

Kentish Town has always been cool. In that sense, HMV Forum is cool too, although still as gritty. Few years on, the venue had decided to organize better ventilation for the audiences, as well as step up security at the benches on the upper levels. Okay. Pretty decent. There shouldn't be any sort of moshing anyway. The age of the band members indicated the average age of the audience. Oof. The man cleverly purchased tickets for upper level seats instead of the free standing. I wouldn't be too pleased about having to stand in the middle of a crowd to hear bands that I wasn't exactly enthusiastic about.

Shrouded in darkness with the occasional strobe lighting, industrial metal Godflesh played against the backdrop of video projections of random images, animation and cartoons. Okay. They're not an English band I know. Birmingham. They held my attention for three songs, then I was kinda bored. Totally didn't appreciate the live sound that didn't seem different from a 7.1 system. Honestly, there's a reason why drummers exist.

More interested to hear Neurosis live. Formed in 1985 in California as a hardcore punk band, they've moved towards a post-metal sort of sound and musical direction. Admittedly one of the earlier influences of today's post-rock bands (i.e Russian Circles), I finally understood how that had been derived. Hypnotic. Not my fault that I was lulled into sleep towards the end of the show.

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