sunn o))) hippodrome rpt

M

Magz Hall

Active member
was blown away last night watching sunn o)))-at the Hippodrome of all places-
did others make it? -it was certainly an extremely physical experience- a mammoth hour and a half hour set, catching it from the balcony it was like being on the deck of a huge futurist dazzle ship starting into a sonic void of discontent. Huge speakers hanging over an invisible audience and band completely eaten in a sea of mist, amazing stuff – the cloaked sunn o))) visible for passing moments soon to disappear into the void of sound which held center stage.
Burning Star Core was also excellent and Russell Hasswell and Hecker won me over transporting us to a kind of sonic military runway in the darkest reaches of power, exhlilerating and disturbing at the same time- this felt like art at the freize fair - shock horror.


http://www.youarehear.co.uk
 
T

tatarsky

Well-known member
Sunn O))) @ Hippodrome Report

Wonderful evening of bludgeoning noise last night, courtesy of sunn o))) and friends. Anyone else there?

Support was pretty good. Missed most of Leopard Leg, but from what i saw they looked entertaining enough, with their brand of chaotic ritualistic drum and vocal rounds. Enjoyed most of Burning Star Core too, apart from the a fairly aimless piece involving vocal treatments (that just sounded like comedy alien noises from Red Dwarf of something). The rest was highly engaging, once you allowed to be so. Kind of reminded me of the Alva Noto performance at Tate Modern a while back (except without the visualisations) I'm finding with this kind of noise/drone textural stuff, the ONLY way to enjoy it in a live setting is to sit down, close your eyes, and concentrate. If your standing up it just doesn't work, because your vision just destracts you, and the subtleties of what is occuring fail to reveal themselves. I am the only one to think like this? Because everyone else stands above me (slightly muffling the sound) and just looks bored. And then some metaller interjects a cheery "Fuck off!!!".

The only disappointing aspect of the evening was Haswell and Hecker's piece, which involved them using Iannis Xenakis' UPIC composing system to create, well, silly noises and cheesy projections of sine waves. The textures were good enough, but there was absolutely no sense of progression, no narrative within the work, just a procession through various hideous noise. The only real aspect of note was the use of 5.1 to project sound from different directions, but that was mere novelty. That and the occaisional sub wave penetrating you which is always pleasurable (at one point i realised my nutsack was vibrating, which i've never had before). The visualisations were particularly lame, and the whole thing just came off as ill thought out, as if it was the first thing they knocked out from this system. Heard much much better version of this kind of thing (that Tate Modern event thing in particular).

And finally Sunn O))), who were majestic. One long piece that got louder and LOUDER (ears still ringingggg), as the guitar drones and gutural death wails mounted up. Weirdly, it wasn't aggressive in any way, more mourning, dread, ritualistic. The physicality of it all was impressive. Perhaps the loudest gig i've ever attended, the sheer volume creeping up on you, as more and more guitarists and then a guy on moog added to the consistent waves of distortion. You didn't really perceive these additions, neither musically (as they're all near as dammit playing the same thing a lot of the time) nor visually (as the entire venue was enveloped in smoke). There could have perhaps been more variation, but this would have distracted from the ritualistic element.

Time seemed to alter, and you had the distinct impression that this ritual was to be eternal. It wouldn't have seemed inappropriate for the performance to go on through the night. As we sloped off, our bodies recovering from the onslaught, we'd be left with a vision of skeletal hands emerging from cloaks through smoke caressing guitars for ever.
 
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