After all those years of concerts with a lamentable lack of crowd surfing, I’ve hit two in a row where musicians mindlessly toss themselves into the care of their equally addled listeners. What luck! What passion!
What butt-rock!
If there’s indeed a continuum with Metallica at one and and Explosions in the Sky at the other, ...And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead is certainly on that continuum. And exactly where they lie thereon shifts from album to album and track to track. At Saturday’s Bowery Ballroom concert, they slid and shifted along all night.
Trail of Dead are almost never quiet. The show went swiftly from one piece to another, barely giving opportunity for the tinnitus to ebb before heating the amps back up. With a current lineup of six talented musicians, all playing ‘til fingers are well-blistered, it is indeed a wall of sound. Actually, that’s not accurate. Is the spiky/crush-room of death in Indiana of Jones and the Temple of Doom really just a couple of walls? Or do we call it something else? Point being, Trail of Dead produce a Spiky/Crush-Room-of-Death of Sound. Appropriate, that.
Joining Trail of Dead onstage for some of the new tracks—those that were recorded with layered vocals or small choirs in particular—were members of opener Midnight Masses. Though their voices were hard to discern through the S/C-R-o-D of Sound, what sound did eek through made me sad indeed to have missed their set. Let that be a lesson to all of us.
Since The Century of Self dropped, I’d been eagerly awaiting the Bowery show. I figured that it’d be a completely different experience to stand in the midst of a wildly flailing 18+ crowd and hear a nuanced interpretation of the album that I so very much enjoy. And I was largely right, though didn’t especially love the quickly expanding moshpit experience toward the front of the orchestra. But the infectious energy I was hoping for was most assuredly there. And they’re worth seeing just for that.
That and the reasonably excellent song-writing.
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he is amazing bro his style can not be touched....some people dont know what he is talking about caz u dont do what he does he is sickkk bra
by dylyn on Thu Mar 18, 2010 at 11.59 am from the entry: Wiz Khalifa: Burn After Rolling (Mixtape)
Wow,Great post.Thanks for sharing with us. land wi
by wisconsin land on Thu Mar 18, 2010 at 09.53 am from the entry: of Montreal + Gang Gang Dance - Orpheum Theatre (Boston, MA; Oct. 30, 2008)
Ugh. Paste’s profile of Free Energy made me kind of hate them. So does your review. It’s this unctuous defense of good-time rock-and-roll ("we’re just here to party, and we’re awesome!") that seems more self-serving than fun-loving.
by beth on Wed Mar 17, 2010 at 09.41 pm from the entry: Foreign Born + Free Energy - The Knitting Factory (Brooklyn, NY; Mar. 12, 2010)
that inescapable feeling you are referring to, is that like when you hear something and you could have sworn you heard it before because of the nostalgic catchy quality? or is is like when you’ve heard a band exactly like said band?
great post by the way!
by paul on Wed Mar 17, 2010 at 03.15 pm from the entry: The Novel Ideas - "The Sky Is A Field" - Borrow It
Whoa! I had no idea she was enegaged. You would never know with the way she behaves! Wow!
by art on Wed Mar 17, 2010 at 09.48 am from the entry: Nikki Darlin and John McCauley: 1+1=1
This comment stream is so meta. Great review Kelly.
by chris on Tue Mar 16, 2010 at 07.50 pm from the entry: Flying Lotus - "Cosmogramma" - Buy It
no prob. The whole album is excellent, combining some of the harder sonics of Los Angeles with the meat of his debut and obviously difficult to summarize in only 50 words… 
I’d say it’s on par with the debut, but better than Los Angeles.
by kelly on Tue Mar 16, 2010 at 06.23 pm from the entry: Flying Lotus - "Cosmogramma" - Buy It
these are some hot photos!
oh man. This is the review I should be writing after covering back to back screamo shows.
photo number 4 is album cover worthy!