By: Jim
5.19.08

Led to the Grave photo credit: Mike Gethin

The Time and Place: O’Brien’s Pub, Allston, MA 9pm 4/26

The Review: Double-bass pedals, Helium, and Bleeding Eardrums…Yep.

Sometimes I just really feel like going to a metal show, as I used to in Portland, ME at the now defunct Alehouse Metal Mondays. Tonight’s show was exactly what I always look for from a metal set: low end crunching, raw vocals, serpentine drumming, and in the end just pure entertainment.

The Arkham White started off the show with a solid set, Rowan Curran, who doesn’t look like your average metal singer, kept all eyes focused on stage with his extremely animated stage presence while Matt Decker, Dennis Hoey, and Steve DeMartino’s riffing pounded away to Kenny Goshgarian’s drums. The Arkham White struck me as a bit more screamo than metal, however the intensity of their set made them an appropriate member of the bill.

Next up was Led To The Grave, a well crafted four piece from the Quincy, MA area, filling in for Hostile Takeover who couldn’t do their set do to some drummer trouble, apparently. Jeff’s (I didn’t catch his last name) double-bass pedal work blew me away as he made machine gun vibrations flow through the floorboards of O’Brien’s while CT and Chris’s axe-chopping made my ears bleed (in a good way) over Pete’s bass lines. All the staples of metal were there: Beatbreaks, chunky rhythm, bestial screams and growls, and overall I was simply impressed with how tight these guys were together. It was clear that they have put in a good amount of practice time honing and refining their live sound. There was also a good deal of humility about this band that I noticed when I got a chance to talk to some of them after their set. Though you might not guess it from the aggressive rock-out they displayed on stage, these are very jovial, friendly, and pretty much down to earth guys when you first meet them. We had a rousing discussion about absolute awesomeness of GWAR (in just about every way), among other things, over a few cigarettes.

The last band I saw that night was Powernap on Satan’s Floor. If their moniker hasn’t tipped you off already it was pretty obvious that these guys really don’t take much seriously, especially themselves. This became obvious when the guitarists and bass player began running around through the bar and outside on to the sidewalk while playing (they had wireless hookups, obviously) and later when the band broke into a Latin Funk section in the middle of a fairly heavy tune. The one thing that kept going over and over in my mind as I listened to them was “Dog Fashion Disco would be proud…or pissed off.” Not sure which it would be since DFD and POSF are both pretty damn weird. At the very least, Powernap was unique. I mean, how many metal bands have you seen that start their set by having one of the guitar players inhale helium (from one of MANY balloons they for some reason had on stage with them) and declare to the audience in an Alvin Chipmunk falsetto: “Hello there! We are Powernap on Satan’s Floor and we’ve come to kill you all!! Just kidding, we love you!” None, I thought so. Also, just for your information, the guy who said that calls himself Satan…I’m not sure who’s been powernapping on his floor, but that must be as unique an experience as seeing this band perform was. All in all I spent about as much time laughing as I did head-banging to these guys and I can only imagine what horrors/hilarities their lyrics must contain.