My first Death Metal Concert.
Alright, I saw Opeth, Paradise Lost, and two other bands, last night. My friend got me and my fiancé tickets in order to expose us to “his” type of music.
I try to not stereotype things, or to go into new things with bias. Try as I might though, last night, before the concert, I have to admit that I had a bad image of the “death metal” scene. I imagined nonstop growling, loud uncoordinated music, and a legion of slovenly male fans and no females. I have to say, I was pleasantly surprised. To be sure there was some growling by the musicians, and their were quite a few slovenly male fans (but a lot less than I expected) and there were females there to.
The place sucked (It’s Jaxx, in Springfield VA). Even the best concert in the world could not make up for the level of discomfort I felt being crammed into that sausage of club. As much as I didn’t like the actual location though, I have to say, I enjoyed the concert.
The first band was pretty good; the lead singer was a woman-who sounded almost Gaelic, she had a nice voice. Her band seemed a bit, as my fiancé said, “confused”. The second band I didn’t particularly care for, and the third I thought was pretty good.
Opeth.
Everyone obviously came to the show to see Opeth. I hadn’t really heard much of them, except for my friends assertion that they are immortal Gods and the like. The place really got intense when they hit the stage, and the temperature must have shot up 15 to 20 degrees because I was sweating like a fly in shit after the first few songs. The lead singer had a surprisingly very good voice. I was actually a little shocked because the first song he did, he growled most of it. Then I hear his voice and wow, what a difference. It sort of made me cringe when he growled his words again-I mean, doesn’t that hurt the throat?
In any event I had fun.
As I said their were a few detractions, mostly assaults on my comfort level. The first was getting into Jaxx. They made us wait outside in the cold for, in my estimation, too long. Granted I heard that in the past the let people stay outside waiting to get in, for over an hour in a half-so I can’t complain much their. The second detraction was the crammed “sardine” can atmosphere. Jaxx isn’t a high quality club to begin with, the urinals are very disgusting and I’m guessing that the reason the walls are painted black is to save them money on cleaning bills. Personally, I’m not one to get “close” to my fellow man, especially after he’s been jack-hammering shots of vodka. The third detraction was the “headbanger” effect. I think it’s cool that people get into the music, head bang, dance around and what not-that’s not what I’m referring to. What I’m referring to is the complete idiot in front of me who was wildly swinging his head up and down and came inches away from headbanging me and a couple other people. At one point he swung his head back and a mass of his hair landed in my hands. Don’t ask me why, because I don’t really know, but I instinctively closed my thumb to my hand and a few of his hairs came out (maybe like 4-5) in my hands. The guy didn’t notice and I felt bad, but not too bad, because I evidently didn’t cause him any pain.
The fourth and final detraction was the lady right next to me, my fiancé thinks it was the guy in front of us; in any event, one of the two loathsome human beings had an intestinal problem because he/she was pumping out more gas then my house. It was oddly revolting because her/his gas intensified with every wave of putrid green odor. Normally I would have moved away, but as I said Jaxx was packed and moving wasn’t much of an option. So I had to endure her odiferous emanations.
Other than those four detractions, I enjoyed myself. I’m also going to start listening to an Opeth cd my friend made. The cd does not include much growling, it is mainly their “singing” songs.
Anywho, I would like to reiterate that I was pleasantly surprised that my bias and stereotypes were not true.
“Cookie Monster vocals”!! That’s some funny shit!