3 [LIVE REVIEW] High on Fire / Priestess / Black Cobra @ Chop Suey

Words by Death Metal Dr. Gonzo

High on Fire, Priestess, Black Cobra
Chop Suey - May 4, 2010

Next to Mastodon’s gig at Nuemo’s last year and Shrinebuilder’s show earlier this year, I have a hard time thinking of any concert I have had greater anticipation for than the arrival of the mighty High on Fire for a headlining gig in Seattle. The RV parked outside Chop Suey had to be a mere decoy for the Viking warship I know the band rolled in on. I could smell hints of smoldering remains and mead around the entire 1300 block of Madison as Capt. Weirdbeard and I approached the venue.

Black Cobra, of San Francisco and Southern Lord Records, opened the show. The drum and “detuned so far it might as well not be a guitar but god damn that’s heavy” guitar duo laid down some real heavy breakdowns and precise post-thrash, clearly having fun beating the already-drunken metal mongrels in the crowd with gnarly volume.

Next, Montreal’s Priestess took the stage. I don’t have good things to say about Priestess, but I am going to say them anyway. First, Rush and Ion Dissonance soaked up all the metal potential from Canada – so Canadians: don’t try. Second, if you are going to harmonize guitars, play something interesting and be more ambitious than just doing a fifth over the other guitar the whole time. Third, if you are going to have clean vocals, then fucking sing in key. Shit. I have not been so under whelmed in some time. Priestess sound like a Blue Oyster Cult record from the late 70’s. Capt. Weirdbeard completely disappeared early in the set and I found myself looking at the time every few minutes and anxiously shaking my empty can of PBR.

Finally, the stage was cleared and a massive Emperor stack crowned with a Soldano SLO-100 was turned toward the crowd. More pieces fell into place and eventually Matt Pike, Des Kensel and Jeff Matz took the stage. At long last we were all in the same room as High on Fire, who wasted no time breaking into “Frost Hammer” from their new album ‘Snakes for the Divine’, playing the song at an even more frantic pace than on the record.

Christ, I wish this show would have been at Neumo’s. It was clear early on that Chop Suey’s P.A. had no business trying to handle the sonic girth of High on Fire. Matt Pike’s guitar was nearly washed out by the resonance from the kick drum (hello sound man – have you heard of a low pass filter?!) and the bass was clearly equalized more toward the g-funk shit that Chop Suey usually hosts, confirming the suspicion I had earlier while getting frisked by some Kevin Federline-looking bastard wearing Lugz and a ridiculous faux-fur hooded coat. Damnation!

Luckily, High on Fire were not deterred by the sonic inadequacies of the venue. They shredded through song after song from their impressively deep catalog, drawing quite a bit from 2002’s ‘Surrounded By Thieves’ and even a couple from ‘The Art of Self-Defense’. Jeff Matz filled the gaps between songs with fuzz bass of death, until Matt Pike would roar “RUMORS OF FUCKING WAR!!!” and the band would resume annihilating the disoriented, moshing, sweaty mess of a crowd. It goes without saying that the guitar solos were off the hook, but you don’t really (I mean, REALLY) realize how awesome Matt Pike is until you are ten feet from him committing unnatural acts on his nine-string. Most “guitar heroes” can’t handle a wimpy Stratocaster, and here’s Pike with an axe looking like it was pulled from the heart of a thousand year-old redwood. The guy kills.

The band shredded the title track from “Snakes for the Divine” and cleared the stage. The crowd barely had time to collect themselves before the band came back and played “Bastard Samurai” and “Fury Whip” for good measure. It’s a wonder anyone was capable of language after such a performance. I was heavily disoriented as I tried to remember where I parked, fuck it, what city was I in? Seattle endured the most severe assjacking of this decade, but it was just another night for High on Fire. I was tempted to follow the path of entrails to their next appearance.