Following a simple
(yet complicated) turn of events, I managed to salvage what was left of the
29’th of April and bought myself a ticket to go see The Ocean, with hopes they would play something from the first half
of their catalogue. Alas, to render on stage the work done by a sufficient
number of people able to spawn across five bands seemed rather implausible, so they
didn’t. But more on that later.
Responsible for the
opening act were the lads from Lo!,
roaring and churning their guitars and vocal chords, building up atmosphere and
being rather straight forward with the crowd, all of the fifteen individuals present in the front
of the stage (well, it could have been a bigger number, but it seemed as such
to me). From what I could comprehend, they play a mix of hardcore/sludge/whatever
which in theory should work, yet it didn’t. Not on that stage, not with that
sound anyway. Curiously enough, the last song they played (which they said it
was from their newest album) turned the tides around and hit everything with the
force of a crumbling brick wall: a monstrous post-metal rendition up there with
the best of them, including a breakdown to die for, after which I was left to
wonder how in the world their previous songs were so boring and the last one so
damn cool. Anyway, I made a mental note to check on their latest release and
bought myself a Lo! t-shirt (14
euros? A steal!).
Up next were The Ocean, and my fears of what I was
to hear all turned true. If you’re aware of The Ocean’s music, you know what they sounded like at the
beginning. If you don’t, go and listen to Precambrian and then get back to this
review. Anyway, for the era following Precambrian (pun intended), The Ocean settled into a normal band
formula and released Heliocentric, a ‘miss’ record, one that I couldn’t bring
myself to listen for more than five times.
After that there was a small (yet still insufficient) redemption in the
form of Anthropocentric: it had its
highs and lows, but it was listenable at least.
And now Pelagial,
another oceanic concept album meant to sweep the rug from under our feet, yet
as soon as I heard the wails of Loic’s clean vocals, I cringed. It felt like
Heliocentric all over again and I couldn’t shake that feeling for any of the
songs they’ve played. The only high point of their repertoire was the track
‘Roots & Locusts’ from Anthropocentric, but even that one was barely
recognizable. A second mental note was made, to listen to Pelagial from the
comfort of my home and see if anything feels different, thought I highly doubt
it.
While Jonathan was battling with the boredom,
the sad thoughts and the disappointment, I was somewhere around the big city,
enjoying a delicious gourmet burger and then some cake with a special lady
friend. I figured Lo!’s music didn’t
exactly blow me over, so there would be no sense in trying to rush to the show.
Plus, I was sure it was going to begin at 10PM or something, which apparently
wasn’t the case. - Chester
Enter Chester. I mean,
literally, if he were to be a little more fashionably late, he would have
missed the whole show (j/k lol, he actually caught the last twenty minutes or
so of The Ocean). We had a beer, stared
like two lunatics at the merch stand and talked about how we were cooler than
anyone else around (not necessarily in this order), then I asked him his
opinion about what he’d already heard. I don’t think he had any time to answer
it, though, because I was babbling away like a little girl on crack.
So yeah, while I was rushing to the venue, I
casually sent a text message to Jonathan, asking him if Lo! had even begun playing. When he told me The Ocean were already well into their set, I freaked out for a
bit, but luckily I was pretty close. Unfortunately, the sound was pretty awful.
I could barely make out the vocals and everything sounded muddy and confusing.
This wasn’t what I had expected.
Which leads me to the
following rant: Cult of Luna stepped
on the stage and suddenly all the god-awful sound went away in an instant,
leaving a crystal clear guitar delivery, crisp vocals and drum beats to rip
away your chest. I absolutely HATE IT when opening bands are treated with the
shittiest sound ever, especially when playing a club venue. I mean, when Lo! and The Ocean were on stage, the vocals were muffled to the point of
being completely incomprehensible, the rhythm guitar had absolutely no volume
and the bass was too mixed up with the drums. And then up comes Cult of Luna and everything is bright
and shiny. With that, a big FUCK YOU! to
whomever decides these things, may you rot away in the attic of a mansion while
you’re silently waiting for the return of Edward Cullen!
With regards to Cult of Luna’s show, may it be duly
noted that I haven’t had the pleasure of delving into their music before hand,
so you could call this ‘my first time with the lunatics’ (hey, it doesn’t sound
that bad now, does it?). All in all, I liked about 80% of the stuff that they
played, a short summary of my feelings towards them taking the form of the
shouted line of ‘Bine bă, fir-ați ai dracu’!’ (which would roughly translate to
‘Great job, motherfuckers!’).
I loved Cult
of Luna’s set, especially I:
The Weapon, which sounded fucking great.
The high point of their performance, apart from the excellent sound, as
Jonathan pointed out, were the stage lighting effects. The band was simply
drowned in light and all you could see where seven black silhouettes set
against the white/blue light of the stage. Having said that, the show was
insanely long and I felt it was never going to finish. After being on the road
all day, interminable post-metal songs weren’t exactly what the doctor would
have prescribed. Another interesting thing I noticed was that there were some
screens in the left hand side of the venue, which were showing Federico Fellini’s
La Dolce Vita. The mix of Cult of Luna’s atmospheric post-metal
songs and Fellini’s lavish masterpiece was almost psychedelic. And, seeing how
I was about to leave for Rome in the following two weeks, it all seemed eerily
coincidental.
And that’s about it.
Me and Chester parted ways (as he was so tired that at times I could have sworn
he fell asleep during the show) and I rode back all of the seventy kilometers
to my home crib, where I indulged in a later-than-midnight dinner from which I
haven’t yet recuperated. See you at Riverside, minions!
It should also be noted this was the first time
Jonathan and I ever met and I just wanna say that he’s a sweet bro and I’m glad
to have gotten the chance to chat with him. Miss u boo!
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