To lock eyes with a wild beast
In case you haven't heard, I am in the market for a new career. It was an entirely voluntary decision, and although I wish the timing were better considering the overall state of American employment, the situation is not as dire as it might seem. Yet.
So, why a new career, rather than a new job within the same field? Well, I ain't willing to move, and even if I were, opportunities to get paid for spouting off about popular culture are drying up even faster than the physical media I'd be writing about. Everyone's got an opinion and a blog to go with it. I also used to have much more enthusiasm for writing than I do right now. Rather than trying to stake my claim in the fickle freelance writing market and subjecting myself to the sort of obsequious schmoozing that would be required, I'd prefer to find a regular old job that would require my skills more than my creativity. That way, I can go back to writing for recreation, perhaps for an occasional supplemental check but not as a primary means to afford food, gas and mortgage payments.
Time shall tell if this gamble pays off. I figured I'd have more time to maintain this poor, dusty blog between stints of job hunting, although that has yet to be the case. So as not to seem completely inactive, I'll finally begin the year by finishing up last year's business. First, I'll complete my look back at my massive mid-November Minnesota weekend. That's right: day 2 of Heathen Crusade III.
11/15/08
I am not as young - nor as old - as my heart often feels. I remember feeling like crap after the first night of the second Heathen Crusade, but waking up for the second day this time was extremely rough. My head throbbed, my neck ached and my sinuses were clogged. Worst of all, I couldn't make coffee in my room, despite the in-room coffee maker. All housekeeping had left for me was decaf, which is strictly for senior citizens, ulcer sufferers and idiots. I was reluctant to bother the hotel's desk staff, since I'd already hassled them about my room's lack of a toilet paper spindle, soap and shampoo. (I could deal with the bathroom's scent of moldy corpse.) Plus, the scene in the rest of the hotel when I'd returned the previous night made me wary of leaving at all. In addition to the collection of gangsta thugs and cops parked in front and hanging out in the lobby, the hallway had reeked like Woody Harrelson's rec room, and in some nearby suite, a dog had been barking up a storm. I really don't like that sort of drama. Nonetheless, after a while, I could take no more of the headache, and reluctantly ventured past the door.
Housekeeping couldn't help, since the hotel was all out of regular coffee packets. I was resigned to walking to a nearby Burger King, all booger-eyed, greasy-faced and lunatic-haired, when the nice lady at the desk informed me there was a fresh pot in the little "continental breakfast" alcove. "Just promise me you won't spill it on the floor," she pleaded, and I might have been insulted if it weren't for the desperate look in her eyes. Once I got to the coffee, I understood. A woman I'd place somewhere between forty and seventy (picture a live-action Eleanor Abernathy) was stumbling about, chattering to herself and half-assedly wiping at the floor with cheap paper towels. She bleated something to me about being careful, since she'd just spilled the coffee. I filled a cup, mixed in some crappy powder creamer and slipped off, but not before shooting the poor desk clerk a sympathetic look. Later that day, while returning from my lunch walk, I overheard the clerk telling the crazy lady that she couldn't stay at the hotel if she couldn't pay... needless to say, I stayed in reading "The Pitchfork 500" and glancing at E!'s "101 Most Unforgettable SNL Moments" until it was time to roll out.
Under Eden: The day began with a Minneapolis group with whom I was somewhat familiar, having been impressed by their 2003 demo, Songs from the Savage Circle, which had led to a contract with the now-defunct Greek label Black Lotus. Five years on, I'm almost completely burned out on melodic death metal, which is what these guys do. Under Eden aren't particularly unique or innovative, nor do they deal with lyrical subjects appropriate to this event, yet I found myself enjoying their brief set anyway. They injected some thrashy and blackened moments that helped break up their riff fests, and there were none of the musty metalcore influences you'd expect from Americans playing this stuff, although I'd recommend they drop the unsuccessful clean vocals. I guess I'm just a sucker for melodic metal guitars, and this quintet's lead guitarist projected the sort of non-scenester expertise I could appreciate. Under Eden were the only melodic death metal band on the weekend's bill, thus adding to the event's diversity. Still, by the time they announced their last song, I'd had enough.
Velnias: Next up was a Chicago band I'd been meaning to see for a while, but hadn't gotten the chance. Their 2007 demo, Pacing the Cyclic Nether, was pretty different among local black metal outfits, offering meditative acoustic passages and an organic, unhurried European-style atmosphere unparalled in these parts aside from the underrated Clad in Darkness. I was unaware that they had developed more of a doom-based sound, so imagine my surprise when they took the stage and unwound their entire new album. Illuminated by a jillion candles, the trio started slow, gradually whipping their murky sludge into bracing climaxes that felt natural and unforced. Although they occasionally harnessed simple folky melodies and blasting black metal ferocity, the engrossing power of Velnias' set came from their patient construction of hypnotic mood rather than memorable hooks or scathing rhythmic overload. As the doom genre's sole representative at HCIII, they provided a fittingly natural counterpoint to the weekend's more intense acts, while their relatively stripped-down gloom proved a perfect complement to the triumphant, mountain-sized peaks of the second day's comparably long-winded headliners. I mean, you know it's a good doom set when you see someone in the audience so enthralled by the narcotic proceedings that they inadvertently drop their beer.
Chaos Moon: With a logo like that, I expected a crew of corpsepainted, spike-wearing uglies, and was almost disappointed that Chaos Moon took the stage looking like normal metalheads. The joke was on me, as this outfit turned out to be the day's best pure black metal act. Their attack was harsh and repetitive, as the genre dictates, hallmarks being speedy tremolo picking, unmoshably quick percussion and blood-curdling screams that stretched over seemingly random musical measures, as opposed to being boxed tightly into Chorus A, Verse B, etc. But the band's material was also steeped in minimalist minor key melody, blending the more feral traditional variety of black metal with the dreary ambience of the popular "depressive" style. Best of all, it was professionally delivered without the corny posturing often seen in the U.S. underground - no silly evil stage banter nor breaking of somber character. If I hadn't done any research prior to the fest, I might have guessed that Chaos Moon were from Germany, as they exuded the same no-nonsense, violent yet intelligent ritualist tones as that country's premiere black metal acts. Nope... they're from fucking Nashville!
Oakhelm: If you look back to my comments about Ulveheim, you'll see that I've come to terms with the idea of Viking metal from non-Scandinavian points of origin. Norse mythological and historical themes have been explored extensively in the metal scene over the past decade plus, but while I'm more interested at this point in hearing from other cultures (Latin, Asian and Middle Eastern seem most promising), it's the Norwegians, Swedes and Finns who sparked most people's interest in ethnic metal, including mine. I'm always down for a good Viking metal band, and Oakhelm, who also draw inspiration from Celtic traditions, is one of the best American examples I've ever come across. I was thus very pleased that the Portland, Oregon quartet was added to the fest's lineup after one of the European acts dropped off. This band is all about surging melodic riffs, whether accompanied by black metal blasting or a trusty midpaced Viking trudge, and once the HC Ale did its job, those riffs became more powerful than I could have guessed. Best of all, the harsh vocals by bassist Pete Jay (coincidentally, once of leftie grindcore legends Assück), which are the only monotonous component of Oakhelm's otherwise excellent debut, Betwixt and Between, had far more dimension in person. Although the acoustic side of their keyboard-free warchants was neglected, they were even better live than on CD, and I promptly forked over some of my closely-guarded dollars for one of their longsleeves, the only piece of clothing I bought all weekend aside from a fest shirt.
Wolven Ancestry: Like melodic death metal, symphonic black metal is something I really used to enjoy... like, twelve years ago, when there weren't thousands of bands recycling the same components. One look at Wolven Ancestry's impeccably applied corpsepaint tells you exactly what to expect from the Ontario sextet. In WA's defense, they had more in common with windswept Finns like Catamenia and Arthemesia than the slick Cradle of Borgir teen goth tripe that typefies the subgenre, and their song titles offer jumbo pretense of Bal-Sagothian proportions (e.g. "The Fountain of Ageless Growth, Lifeblood of All Who Doth Bear the Spirit of Gaia," "The Paralyzing Human Fear of All Which Is Essential to the Cyclical Nature of Earthen Prosperity," etc.). Still, while competent and occasionally enjoyable, their music proved to be the least interesting of the day, although I will never forget their set. Not because of the songs, but because of the vocalist's garish fur ensembles, which included a floor-length cape and an amazing headdress, a taxidermist's wet dream that included a wolf's face and myriad tusks. With a fake creature like that, who needs jackalopes?
Metsatöll: The only thing HCIII lacked for me was the cavalcade of exoticism seen at the fest's previous incarnation. Thankfully, Estonia's Metsatöll provided the much-needed flavor you can only get from a band that both hails from an atypical source for metal and draws extensively from its native culture. The quartet's music reminds me somewhat of their neighbors to the south Skyforger, due to slightly jovial but rough-edged traditional melodies, with a touch of the oddly metered, so-trad-they're-prog rhythms of Faroese titans Týr. A mix of Baltic and Scandinavian influence, then, fitting for natives of a land located south of Finland and north of Latvia. These dudes carve their unique niche by incorporating chant-like monophonic singing borrowed from pre-Christian indigenous tunes called regilaul, or runic songs, as well as folk instruments such as the torupill, an Estonian variation of the bagpipes. Along with a thick bass tone and a somewhat thrashy guitar attack, Metsatöll's entrancing and burly ethno-metal blend encouraged perhaps the weekend's most raucous audience response. One-of-a-kind performances that are this spirited, inclusive and strangely anthemic are why I love attending this fest, and as much as I personally love some of the other bands that appeared (such as the two that followed) and despite my relative unfamiliarity with their recordings, Metsatöll were the absolute highlight for me.
Woods of Ypres: Several years in the making, Woods of Ypres' III: The Deepest Roots and Darkest Blues was, in my lowly opinion, the finest metal album released during 2008. I'll surely expound on the reasons for that in my inevitable "best of '08" post (I swear, it will happen), but for now I'll just say that it manages to synthesize vocalist/guitarist David Gold's patented lyrical approach, which is as indelibly personal as metal gets, with grander themes of tradition, expectation, isolation and maturation, all inside the bracing, multifaceted and warmly melodic black/doom/goth metal hybrid that emerged fully formed on WoY's amazing 2002 demo. While undoubtedly emotional and reverent of the natural world, the record is thoroughly modern and explicitly critical of nostalgia and provincialism, making the Toronto-based outfit stand in stark contrast with the rest of HCIII's beery/teary glorification of mythic pasts. I ran into Gold after his set, which I believe was Woods of Ypres' first inside the United States, and tried to discuss this, but I was too semi-drunk to make much sense. He was gracious, however, and complemented my Amorphis t-shirt, which was awful flattering to a prime dorkus like myself.
As for the show, Gold had an entirely different lineup from that which recorded the album, a six-piece largely culled from fellow Ontarians Gates of Winter, with whom Gold also plays drums. They opened with III's most galvanizingly catchy song, "Your Ontario Town is a Burial Ground" (click here for actual footage, complete with typically lame SwordLord intro), which I hope you heard on this very blog some months ago. However, it was the only new song they played, since the rest of their set consisted of the entire aforementioned demo, Against the Seasons: Cold Winter Songs from the Dead Summer Heat. When Gold announced this, I was disappointed for about ten seconds, since I love the new stuff so much. Then they launched into opener "The Shams of Optimism," and it was all over. While the least varied in presentation, the demo is the most aggressive piece of the WoY puzzle, and its allusions to the northern cold proved ingeniously appropriate to the event. It was exquisitely rendered, especially personal favorite "A Meeting Place and Time," which Gold correctly introduced as the best love song he's ever written (this one's been streamed on the blog, too). I really hope these dudes get back to the States soon, because with proper promotion, they would be bigger than a lot of the shit bands that come through town every other month.
Moonsorrow: Finally, the grand finale... and I do mean grand. The last time Moonsorrow played in America, headlining the first Heathen Crusade, they did it in a stripped-down formation. No keyboards, no folk instruments, no colorful backdrop. This time, however, the Finns returned with a set truly befitting their status as august leaders of the pagan metal milieu. They began, as I'd expected, with a truncated version of "Tulimyrsky," the half-hour title song from their latest EP, winding through several slowly unfurling motifs that ranged from somber, rustic elegance to roiling black metal savagery. The major downside as an audience member for bands like this is that unless you're an insane fan (or speak Finnish), singing along isn't much of an option. Still, we did our best as ignorant Americans, augmenting the band's Valhalla choirs as best as we could, and Moonsorrow seemed genuinely impressed at the crowd's veneration. Hey, if you're really into this stuff, you would not have been caught dead anywhere else that night.
For the band's part, they offered a fine cross-section of Moonsorrow's diverse material, including the ultra-Vikingish "1065: Aika," the jaunty "Kylän Päässä," hearty rare track "Tulkaapa Äijät!" and samples of epics "Jotunheim" and "Raunioilla." Even though we could really only pitch in some "oh-oh-ohhhs" alongside the caverous melodies, once the venue filled with such voices, the latter two really did take on the gigantic, mythical quality found in the studio versions. Having now seen them with their full, proper set-up, I can wholeheartedly recommend Moonsorrow's live show to anyone who might have balked. No, they didn't replicate the frostbitten soundscapes of their albums; even if they had Madonna's tour budget and a full orchestra in tow, no one could. They were far better than I'd anticipated having witnessed that set in 2006, though. The rumor throughout the weekend was that Moonsorrow, along with fellow HC vets Primordial, would be featured on the upcoming American sequel to 2008's popular Pagan Fest tour, and it turned out to be true. However, I should have foreseen that these more serious acts would be billed under more digestible drink-along bands Korpiklaani and Eluveitie, as it's the same ignoble treatment Týr got last time. I guess that's what makes them "critic's bands," and me a critic.
To conclude, here is a complete list of every musical act I saw performing live during 2008, in order:
1. Mr. Blotto
2. Cardiac Arrest
3. Averse Sefira
4. Belphegor
5. Immolation
6. Rotting Christ
7. National Jet Set
8. Church Key
9. The Tony Danza Tapdance Extravaganza
10. See You Next Tuesday
11. Beneath the Massacre
12. Born of Osiris
13. The Mars Volta
14. Eluveitie
15. Týr
16. Turisas
17. Ensiferum
18. Rain
19. Urn
20. Daylight Dies
21. Candlemass
22. MC Chris
23. Romance
24. C'est La Mort
25. Darkest Hour
26. At the Gates
27. Mission of Burma
28. Sebadoh
29. Public Enemy
30. Fuck Buttons
31. Dizzee Rascal
32. Vampire Weekend
33. Elf Power
34. !!!
35. Extra Golden
36. Atlas Sound
37. Jarvis Cocker
38. No Age
39. Animal Collective
40. Boris
41. High Places
42. HEALTH
43. The Apples in Stereo
44. King Khan & the Shrines
45. Les Savy Fav
46. Occidental Brothers Dance Band International
47. Ghostface Killah and Raekwon
48. Spiritualized
49. Bon Iver
50. Dinosaur Jr.
51. The Go! Team
52. Holy Fuck (DJ set)
53. Gogol Bordello
54. Mates of State
55. Bloc Party
56. The Cool Kids
57. Radiohead
58. Steel Train
59. Dierks Bentley
60. DeVotchKa
61. Perry Farrell and Guests
62. Explosions in the Sky
63. Okkervil River
64. DJ Bald Eagle
65. Broken Social Scene
66. Lupe Fiasco
67. Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings
68. DJ Momjeans
69. Rage Against the Machine
70. Chromeo
71. G. Love & Special Sauce
72. Saul Williams
73. Flogging Molly
74. Gnarls Barkley
75. Girl Talk
76. Love and Rockets
77. The National
78. Flosstradamus
79. Nine Inch Nails
80. Kanye West
81. Unexpect
82. Sigh
83. Gamma Ray
84. Helloween
85. sBach
86. Ill Ease
87. Casiotone for the Painfully Alone
88. Van Ghost
89. Tim Reynolds & TR3
90. Madonna
91. AC/DC
92. Grand Demise of Civilization
93. Lunarium
94. Ulveheim
95. Nechochwen
96. Inquisition
97. Ancient Rites
98. Under Eden
99. Velnias
100. Chaos Moon
101. Oakhelm
102. Wolven Ancestry
103. Metsatöll
104. Woods of Ypres
105. Moonsorrow
106. Smashing Pumpkins (x2)
107. The Giving Tree Band
108. David Grisman Quintet
109. Acumen Nation
110. DJ? Acucrack
So, why a new career, rather than a new job within the same field? Well, I ain't willing to move, and even if I were, opportunities to get paid for spouting off about popular culture are drying up even faster than the physical media I'd be writing about. Everyone's got an opinion and a blog to go with it. I also used to have much more enthusiasm for writing than I do right now. Rather than trying to stake my claim in the fickle freelance writing market and subjecting myself to the sort of obsequious schmoozing that would be required, I'd prefer to find a regular old job that would require my skills more than my creativity. That way, I can go back to writing for recreation, perhaps for an occasional supplemental check but not as a primary means to afford food, gas and mortgage payments.
Time shall tell if this gamble pays off. I figured I'd have more time to maintain this poor, dusty blog between stints of job hunting, although that has yet to be the case. So as not to seem completely inactive, I'll finally begin the year by finishing up last year's business. First, I'll complete my look back at my massive mid-November Minnesota weekend. That's right: day 2 of Heathen Crusade III.
11/15/08
I am not as young - nor as old - as my heart often feels. I remember feeling like crap after the first night of the second Heathen Crusade, but waking up for the second day this time was extremely rough. My head throbbed, my neck ached and my sinuses were clogged. Worst of all, I couldn't make coffee in my room, despite the in-room coffee maker. All housekeeping had left for me was decaf, which is strictly for senior citizens, ulcer sufferers and idiots. I was reluctant to bother the hotel's desk staff, since I'd already hassled them about my room's lack of a toilet paper spindle, soap and shampoo. (I could deal with the bathroom's scent of moldy corpse.) Plus, the scene in the rest of the hotel when I'd returned the previous night made me wary of leaving at all. In addition to the collection of gangsta thugs and cops parked in front and hanging out in the lobby, the hallway had reeked like Woody Harrelson's rec room, and in some nearby suite, a dog had been barking up a storm. I really don't like that sort of drama. Nonetheless, after a while, I could take no more of the headache, and reluctantly ventured past the door.
Housekeeping couldn't help, since the hotel was all out of regular coffee packets. I was resigned to walking to a nearby Burger King, all booger-eyed, greasy-faced and lunatic-haired, when the nice lady at the desk informed me there was a fresh pot in the little "continental breakfast" alcove. "Just promise me you won't spill it on the floor," she pleaded, and I might have been insulted if it weren't for the desperate look in her eyes. Once I got to the coffee, I understood. A woman I'd place somewhere between forty and seventy (picture a live-action Eleanor Abernathy) was stumbling about, chattering to herself and half-assedly wiping at the floor with cheap paper towels. She bleated something to me about being careful, since she'd just spilled the coffee. I filled a cup, mixed in some crappy powder creamer and slipped off, but not before shooting the poor desk clerk a sympathetic look. Later that day, while returning from my lunch walk, I overheard the clerk telling the crazy lady that she couldn't stay at the hotel if she couldn't pay... needless to say, I stayed in reading "The Pitchfork 500" and glancing at E!'s "101 Most Unforgettable SNL Moments" until it was time to roll out.
Under Eden: The day began with a Minneapolis group with whom I was somewhat familiar, having been impressed by their 2003 demo, Songs from the Savage Circle, which had led to a contract with the now-defunct Greek label Black Lotus. Five years on, I'm almost completely burned out on melodic death metal, which is what these guys do. Under Eden aren't particularly unique or innovative, nor do they deal with lyrical subjects appropriate to this event, yet I found myself enjoying their brief set anyway. They injected some thrashy and blackened moments that helped break up their riff fests, and there were none of the musty metalcore influences you'd expect from Americans playing this stuff, although I'd recommend they drop the unsuccessful clean vocals. I guess I'm just a sucker for melodic metal guitars, and this quintet's lead guitarist projected the sort of non-scenester expertise I could appreciate. Under Eden were the only melodic death metal band on the weekend's bill, thus adding to the event's diversity. Still, by the time they announced their last song, I'd had enough.Velnias: Next up was a Chicago band I'd been meaning to see for a while, but hadn't gotten the chance. Their 2007 demo, Pacing the Cyclic Nether, was pretty different among local black metal outfits, offering meditative acoustic passages and an organic, unhurried European-style atmosphere unparalled in these parts aside from the underrated Clad in Darkness. I was unaware that they had developed more of a doom-based sound, so imagine my surprise when they took the stage and unwound their entire new album. Illuminated by a jillion candles, the trio started slow, gradually whipping their murky sludge into bracing climaxes that felt natural and unforced. Although they occasionally harnessed simple folky melodies and blasting black metal ferocity, the engrossing power of Velnias' set came from their patient construction of hypnotic mood rather than memorable hooks or scathing rhythmic overload. As the doom genre's sole representative at HCIII, they provided a fittingly natural counterpoint to the weekend's more intense acts, while their relatively stripped-down gloom proved a perfect complement to the triumphant, mountain-sized peaks of the second day's comparably long-winded headliners. I mean, you know it's a good doom set when you see someone in the audience so enthralled by the narcotic proceedings that they inadvertently drop their beer.Chaos Moon: With a logo like that, I expected a crew of corpsepainted, spike-wearing uglies, and was almost disappointed that Chaos Moon took the stage looking like normal metalheads. The joke was on me, as this outfit turned out to be the day's best pure black metal act. Their attack was harsh and repetitive, as the genre dictates, hallmarks being speedy tremolo picking, unmoshably quick percussion and blood-curdling screams that stretched over seemingly random musical measures, as opposed to being boxed tightly into Chorus A, Verse B, etc. But the band's material was also steeped in minimalist minor key melody, blending the more feral traditional variety of black metal with the dreary ambience of the popular "depressive" style. Best of all, it was professionally delivered without the corny posturing often seen in the U.S. underground - no silly evil stage banter nor breaking of somber character. If I hadn't done any research prior to the fest, I might have guessed that Chaos Moon were from Germany, as they exuded the same no-nonsense, violent yet intelligent ritualist tones as that country's premiere black metal acts. Nope... they're from fucking Nashville!Oakhelm: If you look back to my comments about Ulveheim, you'll see that I've come to terms with the idea of Viking metal from non-Scandinavian points of origin. Norse mythological and historical themes have been explored extensively in the metal scene over the past decade plus, but while I'm more interested at this point in hearing from other cultures (Latin, Asian and Middle Eastern seem most promising), it's the Norwegians, Swedes and Finns who sparked most people's interest in ethnic metal, including mine. I'm always down for a good Viking metal band, and Oakhelm, who also draw inspiration from Celtic traditions, is one of the best American examples I've ever come across. I was thus very pleased that the Portland, Oregon quartet was added to the fest's lineup after one of the European acts dropped off. This band is all about surging melodic riffs, whether accompanied by black metal blasting or a trusty midpaced Viking trudge, and once the HC Ale did its job, those riffs became more powerful than I could have guessed. Best of all, the harsh vocals by bassist Pete Jay (coincidentally, once of leftie grindcore legends Assück), which are the only monotonous component of Oakhelm's otherwise excellent debut, Betwixt and Between, had far more dimension in person. Although the acoustic side of their keyboard-free warchants was neglected, they were even better live than on CD, and I promptly forked over some of my closely-guarded dollars for one of their longsleeves, the only piece of clothing I bought all weekend aside from a fest shirt.Wolven Ancestry: Like melodic death metal, symphonic black metal is something I really used to enjoy... like, twelve years ago, when there weren't thousands of bands recycling the same components. One look at Wolven Ancestry's impeccably applied corpsepaint tells you exactly what to expect from the Ontario sextet. In WA's defense, they had more in common with windswept Finns like Catamenia and Arthemesia than the slick Cradle of Borgir teen goth tripe that typefies the subgenre, and their song titles offer jumbo pretense of Bal-Sagothian proportions (e.g. "The Fountain of Ageless Growth, Lifeblood of All Who Doth Bear the Spirit of Gaia," "The Paralyzing Human Fear of All Which Is Essential to the Cyclical Nature of Earthen Prosperity," etc.). Still, while competent and occasionally enjoyable, their music proved to be the least interesting of the day, although I will never forget their set. Not because of the songs, but because of the vocalist's garish fur ensembles, which included a floor-length cape and an amazing headdress, a taxidermist's wet dream that included a wolf's face and myriad tusks. With a fake creature like that, who needs jackalopes?Metsatöll: The only thing HCIII lacked for me was the cavalcade of exoticism seen at the fest's previous incarnation. Thankfully, Estonia's Metsatöll provided the much-needed flavor you can only get from a band that both hails from an atypical source for metal and draws extensively from its native culture. The quartet's music reminds me somewhat of their neighbors to the south Skyforger, due to slightly jovial but rough-edged traditional melodies, with a touch of the oddly metered, so-trad-they're-prog rhythms of Faroese titans Týr. A mix of Baltic and Scandinavian influence, then, fitting for natives of a land located south of Finland and north of Latvia. These dudes carve their unique niche by incorporating chant-like monophonic singing borrowed from pre-Christian indigenous tunes called regilaul, or runic songs, as well as folk instruments such as the torupill, an Estonian variation of the bagpipes. Along with a thick bass tone and a somewhat thrashy guitar attack, Metsatöll's entrancing and burly ethno-metal blend encouraged perhaps the weekend's most raucous audience response. One-of-a-kind performances that are this spirited, inclusive and strangely anthemic are why I love attending this fest, and as much as I personally love some of the other bands that appeared (such as the two that followed) and despite my relative unfamiliarity with their recordings, Metsatöll were the absolute highlight for me.Woods of Ypres: Several years in the making, Woods of Ypres' III: The Deepest Roots and Darkest Blues was, in my lowly opinion, the finest metal album released during 2008. I'll surely expound on the reasons for that in my inevitable "best of '08" post (I swear, it will happen), but for now I'll just say that it manages to synthesize vocalist/guitarist David Gold's patented lyrical approach, which is as indelibly personal as metal gets, with grander themes of tradition, expectation, isolation and maturation, all inside the bracing, multifaceted and warmly melodic black/doom/goth metal hybrid that emerged fully formed on WoY's amazing 2002 demo. While undoubtedly emotional and reverent of the natural world, the record is thoroughly modern and explicitly critical of nostalgia and provincialism, making the Toronto-based outfit stand in stark contrast with the rest of HCIII's beery/teary glorification of mythic pasts. I ran into Gold after his set, which I believe was Woods of Ypres' first inside the United States, and tried to discuss this, but I was too semi-drunk to make much sense. He was gracious, however, and complemented my Amorphis t-shirt, which was awful flattering to a prime dorkus like myself.As for the show, Gold had an entirely different lineup from that which recorded the album, a six-piece largely culled from fellow Ontarians Gates of Winter, with whom Gold also plays drums. They opened with III's most galvanizingly catchy song, "Your Ontario Town is a Burial Ground" (click here for actual footage, complete with typically lame SwordLord intro), which I hope you heard on this very blog some months ago. However, it was the only new song they played, since the rest of their set consisted of the entire aforementioned demo, Against the Seasons: Cold Winter Songs from the Dead Summer Heat. When Gold announced this, I was disappointed for about ten seconds, since I love the new stuff so much. Then they launched into opener "The Shams of Optimism," and it was all over. While the least varied in presentation, the demo is the most aggressive piece of the WoY puzzle, and its allusions to the northern cold proved ingeniously appropriate to the event. It was exquisitely rendered, especially personal favorite "A Meeting Place and Time," which Gold correctly introduced as the best love song he's ever written (this one's been streamed on the blog, too). I really hope these dudes get back to the States soon, because with proper promotion, they would be bigger than a lot of the shit bands that come through town every other month.
Moonsorrow: Finally, the grand finale... and I do mean grand. The last time Moonsorrow played in America, headlining the first Heathen Crusade, they did it in a stripped-down formation. No keyboards, no folk instruments, no colorful backdrop. This time, however, the Finns returned with a set truly befitting their status as august leaders of the pagan metal milieu. They began, as I'd expected, with a truncated version of "Tulimyrsky," the half-hour title song from their latest EP, winding through several slowly unfurling motifs that ranged from somber, rustic elegance to roiling black metal savagery. The major downside as an audience member for bands like this is that unless you're an insane fan (or speak Finnish), singing along isn't much of an option. Still, we did our best as ignorant Americans, augmenting the band's Valhalla choirs as best as we could, and Moonsorrow seemed genuinely impressed at the crowd's veneration. Hey, if you're really into this stuff, you would not have been caught dead anywhere else that night.For the band's part, they offered a fine cross-section of Moonsorrow's diverse material, including the ultra-Vikingish "1065: Aika," the jaunty "Kylän Päässä," hearty rare track "Tulkaapa Äijät!" and samples of epics "Jotunheim" and "Raunioilla." Even though we could really only pitch in some "oh-oh-ohhhs" alongside the caverous melodies, once the venue filled with such voices, the latter two really did take on the gigantic, mythical quality found in the studio versions. Having now seen them with their full, proper set-up, I can wholeheartedly recommend Moonsorrow's live show to anyone who might have balked. No, they didn't replicate the frostbitten soundscapes of their albums; even if they had Madonna's tour budget and a full orchestra in tow, no one could. They were far better than I'd anticipated having witnessed that set in 2006, though. The rumor throughout the weekend was that Moonsorrow, along with fellow HC vets Primordial, would be featured on the upcoming American sequel to 2008's popular Pagan Fest tour, and it turned out to be true. However, I should have foreseen that these more serious acts would be billed under more digestible drink-along bands Korpiklaani and Eluveitie, as it's the same ignoble treatment Týr got last time. I guess that's what makes them "critic's bands," and me a critic.
To conclude, here is a complete list of every musical act I saw performing live during 2008, in order:
1. Mr. Blotto
2. Cardiac Arrest
3. Averse Sefira
4. Belphegor
5. Immolation
6. Rotting Christ
7. National Jet Set
8. Church Key
9. The Tony Danza Tapdance Extravaganza
10. See You Next Tuesday
11. Beneath the Massacre
12. Born of Osiris
13. The Mars Volta
14. Eluveitie
15. Týr
16. Turisas
17. Ensiferum
18. Rain
19. Urn
20. Daylight Dies
21. Candlemass
22. MC Chris
23. Romance
24. C'est La Mort
25. Darkest Hour
26. At the Gates
27. Mission of Burma
28. Sebadoh
29. Public Enemy
30. Fuck Buttons
31. Dizzee Rascal
32. Vampire Weekend
33. Elf Power
34. !!!
35. Extra Golden
36. Atlas Sound
37. Jarvis Cocker
38. No Age
39. Animal Collective
40. Boris
41. High Places
42. HEALTH
43. The Apples in Stereo
44. King Khan & the Shrines
45. Les Savy Fav
46. Occidental Brothers Dance Band International
47. Ghostface Killah and Raekwon
48. Spiritualized
49. Bon Iver
50. Dinosaur Jr.
51. The Go! Team
52. Holy Fuck (DJ set)
53. Gogol Bordello
54. Mates of State
55. Bloc Party
56. The Cool Kids
57. Radiohead
58. Steel Train
59. Dierks Bentley
60. DeVotchKa
61. Perry Farrell and Guests
62. Explosions in the Sky
63. Okkervil River
64. DJ Bald Eagle
65. Broken Social Scene
66. Lupe Fiasco
67. Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings
68. DJ Momjeans
69. Rage Against the Machine
70. Chromeo
71. G. Love & Special Sauce
72. Saul Williams
73. Flogging Molly
74. Gnarls Barkley
75. Girl Talk
76. Love and Rockets
77. The National
78. Flosstradamus
79. Nine Inch Nails
80. Kanye West
81. Unexpect
82. Sigh
83. Gamma Ray
84. Helloween
85. sBach
86. Ill Ease
87. Casiotone for the Painfully Alone
88. Van Ghost
89. Tim Reynolds & TR3
90. Madonna
91. AC/DC
92. Grand Demise of Civilization
93. Lunarium
94. Ulveheim
95. Nechochwen
96. Inquisition
97. Ancient Rites
98. Under Eden
99. Velnias
100. Chaos Moon
101. Oakhelm
102. Wolven Ancestry
103. Metsatöll
104. Woods of Ypres
105. Moonsorrow
106. Smashing Pumpkins (x2)
107. The Giving Tree Band
108. David Grisman Quintet
109. Acumen Nation
110. DJ? Acucrack
posted by SoulReaper at 11:47 AM
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