LIVE SHOW REVIEW:
MESHUGGAH & BETWEEN THE BURIED AND ME
Pop’s Nightclub and Concert Venue – Sauget, IL – 06/14/2014
Review by Thomas Woroniak
The Swedish Ambassadors of Fucking Heaviness, Meshuggah, led an all-out aural assault on the senses at Pop’s Nightclub and Concert Venue in Sauget, IL, melting faces and disrupting synaptic connections as they celebrate 25 Years of Musical Deviance. Direct support was provided by Between the Buried and Me, as they mesmerized the crowd with a short, five song set which lasted over an hour, blurring the lines between time and space as they maintain their place at the top of the progressive melodic metal genre.
The venue was packed with eager fans who converged on the tiny township of Sauget, IL. The population of Sauget, IL as of 2012 numbered just 156 people, which is what allows Pop’s Nightclub to operate 24 hours a day. The club is surrounded by a couple of stripclubs, so evenings at Pop’s can get rather interesting. The lower level has a main stage, and a side stage where local acts perform after the main show is over and into the early morning hours. There are two bars on the main level, with additional space and yet another small bar on the upper balcony level.
BETWEEN THE BURIED AND ME
When 8:00 p.m. finally rolled around, Between The Buried And Me (BTBAM) took to the stage as the venue erupted with shouts and cheers. Since their beginning in 2000, the North Carolina quintet have established themselves at the top of the American progressive metal scene. The group played a “short” set of only five songs, however, the set lasted well over an hour. Starting the evening off with “White Walls” from the 2007 album Colors, the band executes the intricate parts flawlessly, stitching together multiple time signatures and interwoven guitar melodies and counterpoint segments, while singer Tommy Rogers switches effortlessly between growling vocals and his clear singing voice.
Next on the list is “Telos” from their most recent 2012 studio release Parallax II: Future Sequence, setting a frantic pace right out of the gate which leads up to a slow interlude marked by bassist Dan Briggs creating some ambient sounds with his delay pedal as guitarist Paul Waggoner plays some tasty leads, creating a sound reminiscent of early Pink Floyd. Returning to the Colors album, the quintet performed “Ants of the Sky”, followed by “Lay Your Ghosts to Rest” from Parallax II: Future Sequence, which is one of my favorite compositions on the Parallax II album, featuring some wonderful counterpoint segments between the guitars and bass. The band’s set was concluded with the epic “Fossil Genera – A Feed from Cloud Mountain” off of the 2009 studio album, The Great Misdirect.
MESHUGGAH
Back in March of 2014, Meshuggah posted an opportunity on their website for fans to vote on what songs from the past 25 years they would most like to hear the band perform. The rule was to pick one song from each album and the votes would be tallied for consideration when creating the setlist for the 25 Years of Musical Deviance Tour. The result proved to be an epic list with some great variations, spanning several decades and highlighting some of the stylistic changes that have occurred during the band’s evolution.
After a brief intermission to allow the crew to clear the stage, the venue went dark as the crowd began to chant “ME-SHUG-GAH! ME-SHUG-GAH!” The band emerged from backstage with the intro to “Future Breed Machine” playing through the P.A. Reaching back to the 1995 release Destroy Erase Improve, the group began their set and like a musical juggernaut, they were unstoppable from that moment on. Next up was the title track from ObZen (2008), which rolled on into a double dose from their most recent album Koloss (2012) – “The Hurt that Finds You First” and one of my favorites from the new album, “Do Not Look Down.”
Chugging along and digging into their discography, the next three songs came from 1991’s Contradictions Collapse, and marked a slight deviation from the sound that Meshuggah has defined over the years. The trio of tunes began with “Cadaverous Mastication,” followed by “Greed” and then “Gods of Rapture.”
Back to back tracks from Chaosphere (1998) highlighted the middle of the set, as the band exploded with the low-end head stomp of “Neurotica” before steamrolling into the extreme syncopation of “New Millenium Cyanide Christ.”
As we enter the home stretch for the set, we are taken once again to Koloss (2012) with “Break Those Bones Whose Sinews Gave Them Motion.” The riff in this song is heavy enough to break some bones, with its slow head-nod headbang groove. The title of the track is taken from a quote that is often erroneously attributed to Albert Schweitzer. However, they are the words of an English clergyman named Jeremy Taylor:
“Revenge… is like a rolling stone, which, when a man hath forced up a hill, will return upon him with a greater violence, and break those bones whose sinews gave it motion.”
The relentless pace and riffing in “Bleed”, another incredible track off of ObZen, showcased how tight this band is live, with Tomas Haake’s kick drums matching Fredrik Thordendal’s and Mårten Hagström’s intricate picking patterns to create a truly unique sound. This is another one of my favorite Meshuggah songs.
They followed up with “Demiurge,” a heart-pounding track off of Koloss before ending the main set with “Straw Pulled at Random” from the 2002 album Nothing. The band exits as the stage goes dark again.
But wait…there’s more!
After a brief pause and the relentless chanting from the audience -“ME-SHUG-GAH! ME-SHUG-GAH!” – the sounds of the mechanized voice of “Mind’s Mirrors” from Catch ThirtyThree (2005) filled the venue, as smoke rose from the stage and dim, moving beams of light pulsed and cast ominous shadows across the stage. The spoken words cast a warning that knowing one’s true self can be a treacherous endeavor:
“The feeding frenzy of my starving soul, gnawing voraciously at the bones,
the exo-skeletal patchwork protecting my own reflection within;
The twin-and-same engaged in the mirrored act of chewing away
at the shell of my attacking self.
The paradox unseen
Treacherous this deceit to make no choice matter
To have and yet lose yourself, until finally all reasons why are forgotten
To live through ones own shadow.
Mute and blinded, is to really see
Eclipse the golden mirror and the reflection is set free”
Amidst the smoke and darkened stage, the band appears and erupts into the pair of tracks that follow “Mind’s Mirror” on Catch ThirtyThree, the brief “In Death – Is Life” followed immediately by its extended counterpart, “In Death – Is Death.”
