Jesus fucking Christ.
Jesus…fucking…Christ…
If the Sex Pistols inspired grubby ne’er do wells to pick up a guitar with their gigs, anyone with access to that instrument should, by the end of this absurdly impressive and rampant performance, burn it immediately and take up summat else. This rampage from zero to zenith is so impressive and otherworldly that by the shock and awe conclusion there seems little point in carrying on.
I’m not sure who is in charge of the thunderously loud and compressed sound shaking the building – the somewhat delirious notes suggest both God and the Devil in equal measure – but it is a violent but precisely controlled battering ram for certain. Part noise, part industrial, defiantly American; it is surely not of Planet Earth.
This is like being 18 again. Experiencing rock and roll at its intended volume for the first time. The awesome power of that first brush with the madness. A band that can instil that in the observer is doing something right. Or something deliciously, terribly wrong.
That is why this is one of the great gigs. Not because of audience pandemonium or whatnot – though by the end the cheers (perhaps as much for survival as artistic approval) are rapturous – but because, even without being fully au fait with the band’s back catalogue, it is so jaw-droppingly, terrifyingly, pleasurable. In an age of commodification and commerce the jolt to the senses is shocking.
The six piece tonight take things up notch after notch after notch. With shards of noise into ambience into layer upon layer of blisteringly taut mayhem. The very air seems to move in pressure waves and oppress. And just when it gets too much…it breaks down into jackhammer beats and thunder. I always fancied my internal organs two inches to the left anyway.
It’s pin-point accurate yet atavistic and provocative. The marriage of complexity and artistry next to the truly primal is astonishing. No matter the unfamiliarity of the bulk of the material to me. Five minutes into the opening scythe through the eardrums and into the brain and it’s bets off time. This is it. The real deal.
Gira and co deliver up a set of majesty really. Brutal majesty. It’s post-rock, pre-rock fuck-you-rock all at the same time.
Whilst a few more sensitive souls are forced to seek cover in the stairwell in the face of such elemental pummelling the rest gasp slack-jawed at every new crescendo and assault – well I do anyway. The repetition at times is more reminiscent of modern Techno with its subtle leitmotifs eventually becoming crushing and overwhelming.
In other words…they are good. Ridiculously good. You may escape with detached retinas but so what. This is the point of entry.
Take note, pretenders. See Swans…consider your options.