Any metal show might have put a nerd like me out of place, but for some reason I thought a bill like this one would have the least opportunity to make me feel awkward. Of course, showing up without a date didn’t help, but something still felt a little off. Maybe it was ME who was making the SHOW feel awkward. Whatever; a tall PBR ordered, I hung around and wrote notes about the side-bartendress being nervous to plug in a string of stage lights that blew the power last time.
She did end up plugging them in, and all was well, so Sir Richard Bishop sat down and made baby faces at the neck of his guitar while his fingers did unimaginable things… Dirty, aggressive things, things that might get you arrested in certain decades in certain countries. Either the Derek Bailey of psych or the John Abercrombie of raga, or both probably, Bishop fought the bar’s murmurous roar, pulling about as much electricity out of his amp as humanly possible. Riding a pedal tone like a camel through the desert was where he was comfiest, but it was the ballad toward the end that really left an impression; must have been out of a fake book, and I might have figured out the tune if the structure wasn’t so bowlegged and his solo so ‘out.’ But that was the way, and the way led to where it led, which was nowhere, and those of us rapt went right along, straight into the beautiful nothing.
OM didn’t waste too much time following, and after hearing what the subs were capable of during the dub-saturated house music at intermission, I decided to keep a little distance. All for not, for whomever ran sound had Al Cisneros’ bass clipping like a motherfucker while Emil Amos whaled on the ride cymbal bell between bizonkers drum fills. The band fought a weird mix, and the synth guy off to the right seemed like he was falling behind in some spots. But they battled through that too, the same way their songs can feel like epic struggles, finishing strong — OM’s final stroke of raw power was preempted with a beautiful solo section of bass that slithered like a 1-ton snake. The coda was big enough to lift a couple horns from the crowd, and most torsos couldn’t help but rock back and forth, as if everyone’s collective forehead was tied to Cisneros’ tuning pegs like a marionette.
A yawn come 11:30 (am I getting old?), with my blood a few degrees warmer than when I got there, mission still accomplished.
