Mastodon Concert Review 04.16.2009

April 17, 2009 by FromTheCrowd
Filed under Concert Reviews

By Melanie Nelson, www.FromTheCrowd.com Concert Columnist

After a venue change from Martini Ranch to the Marquee Theatre, Mastodon was set to headline an evening of progressive/experimental metal with Kylesa and Intronaut opening. This genre was definitely a new one for me, but I was heading in with several preconceived notions of what I would be facing.

We did arrive and walk into an exclusively black-shirt clad, male dominated room. Every individual somehow arranged themselves to stand perfectly still in two foot intervals - all respectively listening to Via Vengeance. Via Vengeance was loud, exceptionally loud when you consider that he’s a band of one. This individual remarkably covered drums, guitar and vocals all on his own.

During the set change, I took the opportunity to peruse the crowd. There was a surprising range of ages and types: many parents were attending to stand guard over their high schooler and friends, there was the expected beer drinking twenty-something crowd and a large portion of thirty to forty year olds. I suspect (this is supported by many logo t-shirts) that several of the latter began as Pink Floyd fans and simply updated their genre.

Chatting with the crowd, it was clearly a night for Mastodon fans. Rick and Cindy W. have been Mastodon fans for 5 years. Leviathon easily stuck out as their favorite album, but Rick was also well informed on their latest album, Crack the Skye. To ensure the vision/story/message of this album was relayed, Rick forewarned me to expect the entire album played cover to cover. The band would then return for a second set of some of their older hits. Mastodon’s new album appears to have some mixed reviews with their departure from a usual style; Rick mentioned having to listen to it a few times to fully appreciate it. This wouldn’t be the first time I heard this from the crowd.

Mixed in the fanbase of such Mastodon knowledgeable people as Rick were people like Gary S. and his friend Mero K., who had simply been dragged to the concert by a friend and were only hoping for a good show.

Intronaut began their set checks and the drummer and guitarist had some truly impressive practice riffs, demonstrating promise for a great show. In fact, drummer Danny received a large deal of applause before the show had even started. Once Intronaut did get underway, their music had the expected hoarse howling vocals of a metal band but their skilled ability with their instruments was well demonstrated and included some interesting lyrical moments. The more I considered their one particular song, the more I realized that the musical interlude woven into it really did resemble the soundtrack from the movie Labyrinth. I can’t imagine David Bowie’s thoughts on that one.

One of my main thoughts during Intronaut’s set was that for a supposed metal concert, this was a remarkably still crowd. Where was the head banging, the mosh pit, the crowd surfing? Did my toes really have nothing to fear?

When Kylese took the stage next, their vocalists were determined to add to the metal atmosphere with the head banging and swinging hair, which made for a much more active band to watch compared to Intronaut’s interesting but physically stiff performance.
The challenge with Kylese is that it really was just ear bleeding noise. While the drummers (two!) were perfectly synchronized and had a rhythm, it was just methodical noise with timed yowling from vocalists Phillip and Laura. Overall I really did prefer Intronaut’s instrumental intricasies.
While I can’t say that I enjoyed the music at this point, it did offer me an opportunity to watch the formation of a mosh pit. With honorable mention of Intronaut’s single Australopithicus, I give you:

The Evolution of Mosh

· A large crowd begins creepily head bobbing in unison

· Participating group inches forward together

· Shoulders are added into head bobbing motion

· Hand and arm slowly raise with “rock on” symbol

· Legs begin to shake in time with head bob

· A small hop is added

Now this hop appeared to be the signal to the surrounding crowd to clear out a large circle to make room for the beginnings of the mosh pit. Sadly, I lacked the ability to interpret this signal. The perils of shortness almost continued, but thankfully this mosh area only numbered three. Everyone seemed hopeful for future crowd participation though.

Mastodon fans were everywhere at the end of Kylese’s performance. Folks such as Matt G. had smartly decided to wait outside or arrive late in the evening to save their ears. Again, Matt was a longterm Mastodon fan who still listed Leviathon as his favorite album. He had no particular expections out of the set beyond wanting to hear some “crazy ass” drumming and guitar riffs.

It was a very different crowd when you reentered the stage area. Twice as many people had come out of the woodwork and were much more energised, chanting the band’s name and randomly cheering for Mastodon’s perforance to begin. Even with the huge crowd, the Marquis’s sloping floor ensured a great view for everyone, including those of us guarding their toes at the back.

For all the Leviathon fans, they were indeed going to have to wait. The first set was the entire Crack the Skye album played cover to cover. A huge screen was onhand to help illustrate the band’s story of an out of body celestial journey with images of the cosmos intersperced with movie clips and stills.

Mastodon fans should have absolutely no complaints over getting their full ticket value because Brent, Bill, Troy and Brann played for two hours. This wasn’t a lazy, ballad ridden two hours either. These four men were getting full body workouts with the crazy ass drumming and guitar riffs I was told to expect. The crowd’s energy stayed with them the entire time through until their ending set of three songs from previous albums. It was a great performance - compared to Kylese’s noise, this was music. It was loud, it made the whole floor and room vibrate, but these men knew how to play and perform. And if your skin wasn’t numb from all the vibrations and your ears weren’t ringing even with your earplugs as you left after that long evening of performances, you were probably one of the very few.