With
Black Mountain’s latest offering, IV, out now for about a full month,
they are in complete tour-cycle mode and in top form. Starting in Europe in
Mid-March they returned to the states Mid-April for about a month of non-stop
shows before fleeing back up into the cold frontier from which they came,
finishing in their hometown of Vancouver on 5/21. If you haven’t already missed
them in your town, let me touch upon why I think you should go see them.
They
opened the show with the opening tracks of IV, “Mothers of the Sun”
& “Florian Saucer Attack”. “Mothers..” is a killer track that showcases all
the things I’ve come to know and love from Black Mountain – beginning with Jeremy
Schmidt’s throbbing synth, followed by a fuzzed out riff from Stephen
McBean that oozes swagger - but played only once… leaving any follower of
the fuzz desperately aching for more. The synth continues to pulse under the
soft vocals of Amber Webber, until a few minutes in when we are graced
once again by Stephen’s fuzz along with the drums of Joshua Wells
and the bass of newcomer Brad Truax. Some great lead guitar work is then
punctuated by a fantastic dynamic change that brings some funk. After their
first 2 songs they went back in time a little bit and played “Stormy High” off
their second album, 2008’s In the Future, followed by a slightly
extended jam version of “Druganaut” from their 2005 debut/self-titled album.
They
came back to IV with the synth-laden “Cemetary Breeding” and slowed
things down just a bit before propelling into what is probably my favorite
Black Mountain track in “Tyrants”. A pummeling intro, followed by a slow build
of phased-out guitar with a great undercurrent of synth work turns into a
fantastic guitar/synth spree of leads and repeating motif’s, with Stephen
and Jeremy extending this section longer than normal. With a swirl of
synth and guitar noise fading out, the crowd began to do something I loathe –
applauding before the song is over… like half the crowd had never heard the
song before… The band let the crowd cheer while their wall of sound slowly
faded – until everyone and everything was quiet enough for the outro.
They
jumped back into material from IV with “You Can Dream” and “Line Them
All Up” before interspersing some older songs with new – playing “Wilderness
Heart”, “Defector”, “Wucan” and ending with IV’s closer - “Space to
Bakersfield” – with its Floyd inspired first half full of phased out guitar
chords and synth play leading up to Stephen channeling his inner Eddie Hazel and making his guitar cry in an extended
solo full of fuzzy wah. I was perfectly placed in front of him to get a couple
fun shots mid-solo, tweaking pedals.
The
band left the stage and was obviously planning on coming back for more as the
house lights stayed off. A few moments later Jeremy and Joshua
emerged from the side of the stage and took their positions. They began to work
out the ambient/spacey intro to “(Over and Over) The Chain” – Joshua had
what appeared to be some synth pads and a tiny module next to his drum kit that
he fiddled around on while Jeremy did the same with his array of boards.
A
few minutes of droning synths went on before the rest of the band came out and
joined them. After that they finished with their usual closer (I’ve seen them
live 3 times over 3 album tours and they’ve always done it), “Don’t Run Our
Hearts Around” from their debut album.
-Mattie
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