I've been looking forward to this show for a while. Isis is a really mighty band, very smart and consciously expressive. I've always loved that they're heavy and intense without ever sounding aggressive or hateful. To me, this really puts them at the forefront of non-mainstream metal.
The Hawthorne Theater here in Portland has a lot of cool metal shows, a great staff, and pretty good sound. What they don't have is any sensibility about lighting. Legend has it that Sunn O))) played there last year, and the venue left the house lights on the entire time, pretty much destroying the whole vibe of the show. I feel like last night's performance suffered in the same way: the house lights were too bright, which took away from my ability to trance out to this music.
Regardless, the music was fantastic. I missed the first band, Mammifer, and I'm sorry for that. The second band, Helms Alee, is a personal favorite of mine. Helms Alee is signed to Hydra Head, and has one full-length out. I was lucky enough to see them a few weeks ago, headlining a tiny show at the East End. That night they were properly magical, and their really powerful and melodic sound was in full effect. Last night, in a much larger but less densely packed environment, the band seemed to have to work for it for the first few songs. However, after an opening salvo of songs from their album, "Night Terrors," the band played some material with which I was not familiar. I honestly hope this is new stuff that they're working on, because the songs I hadn't heard before were my favorites of the whole performance.
A quick note about this band. They are BEAUTIFUL, which makes them a joy to watch. Ben the guitarist is a classic northwest post-punk rocker with a face-hiding head of hair and a sing/scream dichotomy that would make Cobain proud. Dana the bassist is an exotic beauty with deep-set eyes and long black curls. Hoz the drummer is an all american woman with all the blissful facial expressions that make live rock drumming such a great spectator sport. The best part is: they all sing. They each sing parts, and then they trade two-part harmonies. The male-female dynamic in the vocals is probably my favorite feature of this band, and I really look forward to hearing where they take it in the future.
Isis came on stage like ten minutes early. Isis fans know that's really only like one extra song, but it's a nice gift from the band, I think. They played for a full hour and a half, including one encore, and focused heavily on songs from the new album, "Wavering Radiant". It was clear that the crowd was unfamiliar with most of this most recent stuff, but it was definitely in the style we've come to expect from this band, and it sounded great. They played a bunch of songs from "In the Absence of Truth" as well, and the audience loved these jams. The oldest song they played was fan favorite "The Beginning and the End," which was properly anthemic. What I really loved about this performance was the way the way the band really took their time to let the music build. I mean, clearly the music is written to be slow, ambient, and colorfully punctuated, but when performed live the effect is very meditative.
Which reminds me, I definitely love metal crowds. I generally wear the uniform to these shows: jeans and a t-shirt of a band that is not playing that evening. I'm not going to front: it makes me feel cool to be down with these relatively underground bands, and the t-shirts are how we let others know we're down. Most other folks there were in some variation of the uniform. I saw people aged 15 or so to at least 50, including one middle aged couple sporting Tool and Layne Staley Tribute t-shirts. The show was also full of many couples engaged in enough PDA to make the senior class of 2009 blush. I guess Isis is one of those metal bands that attracts relatively more women, which I think is pretty cool. It was great to see both head-banging and slow-dancing (seriously, like prom style with both people facing the band) going on simultaneously.
The diversity of the crowd is a testament to the Isis's well-deserved elder statesmen status. Truth be told, I could have watched them play for more like three hours. They're a really fantastic band, and I'm glad I got to see them last night.
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