Wild hearts, promises and international laws can be broken

Although I said the next post here would be about some movies I watched, I will violate my word and instead provide an update on this week's activities. First, I can report that I am buying and moving into a decent Schaumburg condo next month. This sucker's got a huge kitchen, lots of closet space for my collections of crap, a washer/dryer and one of those badass free-standing fireplaces (too bad it's not orange). It's not so much a thrill as a relief at this point, but the solitude will surely do me some good.

Then there was my whirlwind tour of Toronto for the Day of the Equinox. I flew in early Friday afternoon and immediately embarked on an adventuresome quest for an ATM that would work for me. I'd discovered too late that my recently replaced bank card was missing about half of the logos my old one had, meaning I had fewer cash-getting options, especially in a foreign land. This conveniently gave me ample reason to spend several hours traipsing around downtown Toronto, taking in some sights and finally enjoying a little dinner once I had those funny Canadian bills in hand. Sweaty and tired, I had a little while to hose off and chill at the hotel before hopping a taxi to the Opera House, where everything took a turn for the better. The evening's performers, in order of appearance:

Woods of Ypres - One of the greatest pleasures of travelling for this sort of event is that you get to see "local" bands whom you probably have no other chance of catching live. Sometimes it's a chore, as when you have to endure some boring, typical crud for which the audience is going apeshit because they're all friends with the group. But Toronto's Woods of Ypres was one of the reasons I was sold on attending this show in the first place. I got a copy of the excellent "Pursuit of the Sun & Allure of the Earth" this past spring, at a synergistic time when Mr. Gold's music, words and themes tapped quite directly into my mind and soul like nothing except a new Katatonia album usually does. With a full band, he cranked out some of this stuff (minus the record's copious acoustic guitars, sadly), a demo track and a new one, only to close with a dandy cover of Katatonia's "Deadhouse", during which I like to believe the band was smiling conspiratorially at my "Brave Murder Day" longsleeve as I howled along like a jackass. A promising start, to say the least.

Unexpect - The Opera House's murky sound didn't hurt Woods of Ypres' hothouse atmosphere, but it slightly hindered this oddball Montreal outfit. I posted a link to a song by them in an earlier post, as I had been listening to that mp3 frequently ater checking them out online, since they'd been signed by the discerning folks at The End Records. However, at the risk of abusing the lamest journalistic device that this band will continue to endure, their impressive set was entirely unexpected. At once pretentious and personable, their material twisted and turned with precise, theatrical bombast, splintering massive symphonic black metal riffs into delirious fragments separated by weird art-goth poses, folky breakdowns and a variety of confounding tempo shifts. There was a dude flopping around tapping a nine-string bass, another sawing away on a violin as his bow dangled its abused strands, a keyboardist who looked about 16 years old dressed in some sort of gothic fetish monsignor cloak, and a little guy with a goofy nu-metal pigtail hairdo roaring along with a big, bald, bearded guy, both of them leading the dizzying guitar assault. Then there was vocalist Anick Bouchard, who I am now saddened to learn was only a fill-in. Never mind that she had a crazy intricate design painted around her eye which extended back into the shaved side of her otherwise extremely short hair, the rest of her face painted a stark, spooky mannequin white. Her hair-raising vocals and slinky stage moves, evoking a feminine French Canadian version of Genesis-era Peter Gabriel, were hypnotic in a manner that transcended "metal babe" and approached otherworldly. Or perhaps the jetlag and Rickard's Red had begun to kick in.

Novembers Doom - Funny traveling all the way up to Toronto, only to see a local doom/death band who's been playing a lot of shows around here recently. In fact, I saw these guys only a few months ago in a Chicago bar for $5, when I should have realized going to see a band called Novembers Doom could not be a good omen on a first date. (Seemed like a good idea, since I was listening to a lot of doom at the time... right around when I got that Woods of Ypres album, actually.) As is the case for even their esteemed influences, a live batch of their slow, sad stuff can be really powerful or distressingly torpid, depending on the set list. Their last few albums have shown a great effort to add variety in tempo and tone, with their new "The Pale Haunt Departure" pretty much beloved by everyone that's heard it, and they wisely stuck with the recent stuff on Friday. What impresses me most about Novembers Doom is that although they play strictly by the genre's rulebook, their songs' natural somber richness can stand along the best bands of this sort today, which are otherwise strictly European. In fact, their only worthy peers at this point are probably Ireland's Mourning Beloveth, Finland's Swallow the Sun and doom/death progenitors My Dying Bride themselves, as they each maintain a knack for melodic misery without resorting to played-out "spooky" trappings. Paul Kuhr's lyrics, while never straying from maudlin and traumatic subjects, at least retain a sense of identity and sincerity that assures you they're not just trying to act depressed to impress some tattooed babes. And there were plenty there to impress that night. (As far as I could tell, in Canada the metal girls don't dress like hoochies, know the words to songs that aren't on the radio and even attend shows because they like the music, not because their boyfriends are going. It is a magical place.)

Deceased - By this point, I was pretty well toasted. I'd wandered in and out of Novembers Doom's set, hitting the merch tables and sucking down cigarettes outside (no smoking in the venue, but at least they let you come back in and didn't force you to leave entirely just so you could smoke a lousy cigarette). Deceased are a very good death/thrash band, '80s to their fucking souls, and they of course completely stuck out on this artsy-fartsy bill. That's not to say Deceased aren't skilled or finessed in any way; like Novembers Doom, they've slowly refined their style into something personal over the years, adding lots of melody to their early death metal influences but coming out sounding nothing like the Gothenburg gang. I hadn't seen them in years, since shortly after frontman King Fowley stopped playing drums (he used to play while singing live), and this was apparently their first Canadian show in a decade. Having finally been dropped from trendy tastemakers Relapse Records, where Deceased was actually the first signed act back in 1990, and considering King's alarming health woes, their set was worth a few horns and headbangs in appreciation for their determination alone. However, I've seen 'em plenty of times, and haven't yet heard "As The Weird Travel On", so I didn't feel obliged to watch all of it. I couldn't pay attention and rock out to "The Premonition" after I noticed the person thrashing along to my right was none other than the mesmerizing bald-ish lass who sang with Unexpect. Clumsily, I tried to compliment her on her singing and stage presence, to which she replied very graciously in a charming French accent, then soon afterward moved to the other side of the room. (Such is my legendary charm with the ladies.) Anyway, I was mostly outside, jacked up on Canuck beer - after two separate recommendations, I'd switched to Steam Whistle by this point - and smoking like crazy, knowing I wouldn't want to leave anytime during the following band.

Agalloch - At last, my primary reason for making this trip. It's tough to explain the appeal of Agalloch to someone who hasn't heard them, but they're rooted in the same sort of florid, mellow black-ish metal as early Ulver and Opeth, in recent years adding more neo-folk, post-rock and experimental influences. It's a very peaceful and reflective sound, yet still utterly dismal, and I guess this odd mix of emotions is why they resonate with people like myself. They encourage that cult following by keeping a low profile in the coniferous Pacific Northwest (the mountains and forests of the region feed their naturalist/nihilist aesthetic), having only issued two albums but a slew of limited edition EPs, 7 inches and other nerdy collectors' releases; for all intents and purposes, Agalloch is an indie rock band for those of us who find most indie rock the province of emotionless hipster amateurs. I'd seen pictures of their rare live performances and they seemed pretty elaborate, so I was expecting tympani and banners and whatnot. This was a more stripped down set, though, not that it was any less impressive without all the accoutrements, more "metal" than I'd expected but entirely engrossing. John Haughm sacrificed a bit of his desolate vocal style to the rocked-up renditions, and the muddy mix manhandled their closing cover of Sol Invictus' "Kneel to the Cross," but the older stuff with which they opened (especially "Hallways of Enchanted Ebony") sounded great and the instrumentals from "The Mantle" made me totally lose it, "Odal" only a bit less than the reworked version of "The Lodge." Don Anderson, the other guitarist and co-composer, worked himself into such a frenzy during that one he smashed his guitar at the end, and it was honestly more a logical cathartic action than a corny rock star move. But don't take my measly fanboy's word for it... see Anderson's comments on his blog, and if you want to do me a personal favor, nudge him to get going on the third Sculptured album (announced way back in 2001, with the then-personally-significant title "The Liminal Phase").

Green Carnation - The Norwegian headliners were doing their first North American show, and I really couldn't have asked for anything more than the set list they provided. I'm not so crazy about their recent "The Quiet Offspring" due to its cock-rocky elements, but this was never the most "true" metal band in the world. Sure, it's downcast and layered with organs, and a few of the songs are mighty catchy, but it's got too much "attitude" and lacks the miserable hooks of "A Blessing In Disguise", the contentious previous record where Green Carnation decisively made the switch from the proggy epics they inherted from In the Woods... to a more digestible form of hard rock. The first hour of their set was drawn from these two records, and it was decent, notably what they called their first-ever live rendition of the marvelous "Lullaby In Winter" (I'm in the apparent minority who grew to like "Blessing"). For the second, they played only one song - the one which made up their entire second album, "Light of Day, Day of Darkness", replacing the freaky female vocals with a theremin and generally thrilling anyone who had stayed all night into a coma of gloomy prog metal glory. Quite an impressive display, one which will keep me following the band despite their recent wanderings, because if this particular crowd of musicians have proven anything over the years, they will never keep the same sound for very long anyway. Their new EP, released at the show, is after all just four nice acoustic numbers that sounds like a less chilly Antimatter.

So that was that... flew back the next day to Starbuck's employees protesting at the airport. Big fun. Then later, when FattySaltyCrispies (who, as if she has nothing better to do, really should update her blog) and I were at a local bar trying to shout a conversation over cheering sports fans, the White Sox won and we were handed free beers. So, although I don't care about pro baseball and who's playing what series, if it means free suds and a Journey theme song: Go Sox Go!