Free Music Friday 31!

Last night the ever wonderful Kelly won tickets to see Japanese post-rock band Mono and was wonderful enough to bring me along. As good as Mono were, I was blown away by one of the local opening bands. They consisted of 2 bass guitars and a drummer.

I fucking love bass guitar. So much. Two bass guitars in a band? They have to be amazing. And they are. They are No Anchor.

I've heard a lot of buzz about these guys lately. But I've never had the chance to see them. Until I got lucky last night of course. Their two bass sound borders between crazy detuned sludge hardcore/metal, post-rock (their 5 minute feedback bridge last night an excellent example of this) and even a bit of drum and bass, with some parts giving me a DFA 1979 vibe. But all around, it's the kind of music I just like.

They have a few albums, but their latest one is free over at their Bandcamp. Get on it, and support a great local band.

And if you really dig it, get on over to Waiting Room in West End this week, where they are playing 7 days of shows. All at 8pm, all with different bands, all $5 and all BYO. Every night from October 15 to October 21st. My picks will be October 15 with local hardcore punks Dick Nasty, or October 21 with the USA Shoegaze band Happy New Year.

Free Music Friday!

HAPPY FRIDAY! Do you like free stuff? I do. I was once quoted in the University of Iowa newspaper, at an impromptu meeting with Hoobastank and Lostprophets, as saying

"I'm just here for the free stuff."

So I present to you free music Friday.

After witnessing one of the best gigs I have ever seen on Sunday night, watching Baroness of course, I thought I may go and find out a bit more about this interesting subgenre of metal known as sludge. In my "research" (aka Google, wikipedia and mediafire) I stumbled across a French band called I Pilot Daemon.

Not one to discriminate on the pure fact that they are from a country of cheese eating surrender monkeys I gave them a listen. And I enjoyed. Not purely sludge, these guys throw in a healthy dose of hardcore as well. At times I even pick up a bit of screamo. This fits my current mood and listening habits perfectly.

Here's the free stuff now: their new album. They've put it out on the internet for free, not even in the way that involves you having to go to dodgy websites and put up with ads for granny dating and penis enhancements (although that may just be the internet telling me something). Get it here: http://ipilotdaemon.antiheroes.org/

I'd recommend at least listening to the track El Salvaje. I had it on loop while writing this.

Baroness, October 17 2010, the Zoo

On Sunday night I saw Baroness play a sideshow to their Metallica tour at the Zoo. I'm not normally a metal gig fan (too many idiots), but I would just like to say this.

OH
MY
GOD.


Easily one of the best gigs I have ever been to. Top three without a doubt. Even the band thought it was amazing. They played about 30 minutes longer than they had to, came out and played a rare encore, and spent ages just thanking us. They were as humbled as we were.

The performance they put on blew me away. I was afraid their sludge metal would not be the best live (I should have remembered how much I loved them at Soundwave) but they were all such talented musicians and showmen. I was right in front of one of the guitarists the whole night and just stood there in a musical coma staring with the biggest, goofiest smile on my face.

Thank you Baroness. Thank you.