5.31.06: Heavy Theater

Saw Sunn0))), the minimal metal band, last night. Last Sunday there was a huge article about them in The New York Times which I suspect might dash my hopes for them joining the lineup for one of the nights at Carnegie Hall I’m curating next February. But who knows? I expected a sell out last night as a result of that article, but I guess the Times demographic and the audience for extremely loud minimal metal has a small overlap. I can see the Venn diagram in my mind.

The opening act, Boris, was similar to SunnO))), though much less rigorous in their minimalism and visual presentation. Some prefer their less extreme approach.

Well, it’s not the sort of music you go home humming to yourself. It’s a sensory assault — intense and strangely pleasurable (I wore earplugs). Most of all, it’s theater, well conceived and beautifully executed — and in perfect context (this club venue was a former church). It is also deeply ritualistic.

The stage is cleared before the band enters. There is no drum set or anything else on stage, just a semicircular wall of massive amps across the entire stage, with one amp swiveled slightly to allow the players to enter — this “door” would later be shut behind them. (Here’s a phone picture)

A bit of dry ice smoke wafted across the bare stage and what looked like 6 Sith Lords entered carrying guitars (one guy went to a little Moog set up on the side). Without an introduction the “show” began: a deep throb and rumble that grew in volume and, at given signals, there were added tones and changes in the harmonics around the central deep tone.

As there were no drums the rhythm was present, but more a felt slow pulse than a groove. Heavy is putting it mildly. It could easily tip over into camp or parody, but it never does. Like standing next to a jet engine, it’s no joke.

I thought of Tony Conrad, La Monte Young and other extreme minimal modernist composers from decades ago. Young attempted to insert a bit of theater into his presentations, but never came close to the power of this. I thought of global warming (again), the melting icecaps, the earthquake in Java, the Mayan ruins in Yucatan, computer viruses, government surveillance eating itself from the inside out, Donald Rumsfeld’s mind, ant colonies, big science, Jesus’ dick, Mary’s cunt, and the McDonald's meal a suicide bomber ate, minutes before detonation.

This is contemporary theater.