I am what you could call a "fan" of concerts. And by "fan," I mean a concert is the one place where I can achieve some form of existential tranquility, the one place where I feel completely at home, the one place where I am perfectly content and want nothing more from my life or any of the other people sharing it with me. Let's just say I like them.Being a "fan" of this whole writing thing as well, I find myself writing concert reviews in my head as I'm watching bands play, hopefully retaining some of those thoughts long enough to write them down when I get home.
This, however, was a different kind of concert.
I came home that night and didn't even attempt to write out one of my usual bombastic, ridiculous descriptions of how a band of angels had descended from heaven, plugged in their guitars, and blessed my ears with feedback and noise so holy it could only have come from the hands of God himself. Instead, I went to sleep, woke up the next day well past noon, and wrote this concert review on one of my frequented music sites:
"The musical equivalent of finding God. I can't hear anything out of my left ear and I hope I never do ever again."
Granted, that's pretty much the same thing I always say, minus the whole "describing the actual concert" thing, but still. This concert was different, and that little blurb proves it.
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For those unlucky souls who've yet to experience this little band called Health, I'll attempt to sum up the general experience of seeing them play live.
Health is made up of four members.
Two generic American indie kids both sporting:
- Short, slick haircuts
- Horrifically tight jeans
- V-neck white t-shirts, one of which advertises their Colorado-based electro opening act, Paperplane
One six-foot tall Asian man with:
- Long, straight black hair reaching well past his neck
- Equally as frightening, how-did-he-put-those-on skinny jeans
- A blue t-shirt, reading "Glass Candy" in a hip style and font
One neanderthal-looking man sitting behind a drumset with:
- A ponytail
- ...
- That's all I've got on him
The reason I've gone into such oddly homoerotic detail with the band members is that a live Health performance is all about imagery, more so than any other band I've ever seen. Even the music itself becomes a visual force: as the audience is blasted with wall upon wall of screeching feedback and effects, you cannot help but be hypnotized by the dizzying array of instrumentation onstage, to the point that the music almost becomes an unnecessary distraction from the mesmerizing act that the process of "playing" the instruments quickly becomes.
And when I say "playing," I mean "playing" with every ounce of quotational hyperbole imaginable.
Defining the role each member plays within the band is basically useless. The drummer is the drummer, that much is set in stone, but that's about it. There's the vocalist/guitarist/percussionist/keyboardist, there's the bassist/vocalist/keyboardist, there's the guitarist/vocalist/keyboardist... You get the picture. The stage is littered with guitars and pedals and keyboards and drums and cymbals that anybody at anytime could get up and start playing.
To illustrate just how far this band takes those aspects, take this into consideration: This is a band that uses microphones as instruments. Not as a means of picking up sounds and sending them through speakers, mind you, but as actual vehicles of noise-making.
Seriously.
In what was possibly the most mind-blowing moment of the entire show, the two guitarists and the bassist all fall to their knees in front of their individual arrays of pedals and buttons and flashing lights and begin fervently turning knobs and adjusting effects, while the drummer is sitting in the background making seemingly random noise at will. With a couple quick glances across the stage, the three men all pick up microphones and quickly switch them on.
KRRRAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHYYYYYYYYYEEEEEEEEEOOOOOOOAAAAAHHHHHHHH.
One flick of a tiny little plastic switch opens up a blistering death knell of sheer noise, feedback ringing and echoing and racing through a dozen pedals and switches, all putting their own unique spark of insanity into the mayhem that is washing over the audience at absolute full volume.
The noise sends the band into a frenzy. One of them is on his knees screaming into his manufactured chaos device, his own voice getting lost in the careening digital voices around him. Another has his microphone raised in the air, his head buried in the maze of cords in front of him. Another is dancing across the stage, throwing his body wildly into the air, head tilted back, eyes closed, immersed in the incomparable high of aural destruction.
And then it stops. The microphones are switched off with perfect timing, the feedback is silenced, leaving only the chaotic drumming which pales in comparison to the cacophony that has left the band visibly reeling, almost as if they themselves are in shock of what had just happened.
On some invisible cue, the three members drop to their knees and switch on their mics once again.
KOOOOOORRRRRRRAAAAAHHHHHHHEEEEEEYYYYYYOOOOOOOAAAAAAHHHHHHHH.
Another wave of noise hits the audience, this one somehow more punishing than the one before it. All three men have taken to screaming into their instruments, sounds you could just barely pick out among the impossibly dense feedback. The bassist's hair is completely covering his face and arms, and for a brief second it seems that his very soul is crying out through the speakers.
At this point the sound is truly overwhelming. The stage takes on a nightmarish atmosphere, the flashing lights clouded with smoke, the bodies responsible hurling themselves around the stage, completely immersed in the chaos of it all. Even the most confident and seasoned concert vets begin to back away from the stage, their ears overcome by the violent sounds coming not out of the speakers, but the band's monitors. A look backwards brings you face to face with trendy 18-year old girls in neon sunglasses and puffed up 80s hair wrapped in ridiculously flashy headbands, all nearly doubled over from the pain. And yet the band is unscathed.
The noise relents once more, and then continues yet again, louder than ever. My well-worn actually begin to hurt, a sensation I've never felt at a concert before in my life. I find myself leaning over the stage to escape the sounds of the speakers, my head positioned against the band's monitors, inches away from the tangled web of pedals and cords creating these beautiful, terrible sounds. For a brief second I consider reaching over and hitting the one magic button the bassist has been frequenting all night, the button to make this insanity come to a close.
Finally, the band ceases for the last time, moving onto their next sonic experiment, leaving an entire room of people in total awe, yelling in vain into their friends' ears, trying to communicate the level of pure ecstasy and pain they had just been exposed to.
Every man on that stage is completely and utterly lost in the music. From the energy and momentum pouring out of them, you would have never guessed that they had performed this act hundreds of times before, touring endlessly for years, recording two studio albums and a remix album in the process. Any band can push a few buttons and create feedback, but this band fades into the feedback themselves, becoming a part of the music, putting bodies and faces and movements onto what was once before nothing but sound.
This noise in motion, this living feedback, is what packs the Village and hundreds of venues just like it full of people ready and willing to lose a bit of hearing to experience one of the most exhilarating, unforgettable acts on the music scene today. It is a musical occasion that has to be experienced, not read about, not watched on Youtube, not retold by a friend, but felt.
I can truly say I will never be the same after that night. Only partially because my left ear still rings a little when I sleep.
