My steady diet of Falbo Brother’s pizza, Bass ale, and [adult swim]’s Metalocaplypse has done two things for me: made my pants a little tighter and re-awakened the metal head inside. So while excavating my Ride the Lighting shirt from moth balls and ironing the wrinkles out of my Ozzman Cometh T; I’ve been thrashing around to the three brutal bands poised to destroy the Picador (and surrounding areas) on Friday afternoon/evening; Today is the Day, Lair of the Minotaur, and Mouth of the Architect.
This triple threat set is the fest’s only nod to my days of stiff necks, parent hating, and crippling loneliness, but they’ll crank out nearly enough decibels to pump testosterone into not only the rest of Mission Creek, but Tilly and the Wall’s set from last year’s fest.
Leading the charge is Ohio’s Mouth of the Architect. Even though Ohio went for Hillary and the band’s handle makes me think of Karl Rove, MofA blows you over with enough sound to make you forget your geography and almost erase the atrocities of the current administration. The success of their aural attack stems from the group’s insistence upon straddling the line between full-blown, full-volume thrash and more ornate prog-metal. This dynamic, not only in volume but in approach, make their onslaughts — usually reserved for the ‘chorus’ — all the more pointed and intense.
The second wave: Lair of the Minotaur (from Chi-town) fit the profile for a band on Southern Lord Records (home of Sunn O))) and Boris) to a T. If the first few bottomless riffs from “Cannibal Massacre” (check their Myspace page) are no indication, LotM is not all about speed — that shit’s too thick to be running around with it. The trio is about heavy (really fucking heavy), almost groove-oriented metal. However, Lair doesn’t just ride the riff ad nauseum, they employ the double bass drum to a great degree. It’s these rhythmic changes that give the band diversity (the group doesn’t display much in the way of dynamics, it’s pretty much all forte), the almost mathematical precision the group displays is nothing short of stunning — going from sludge to thrash at the drop of a hat.
And mounting the final assault are Today is the Day, out of Nashville. And as you might expect, dude’s bear none of the marks of the more stereotypical fare from Tennessee’s capital. The leanest, but possibly the most destructive of the three, Today is the Day, deliver gimickless, effortless brutality. But most distinctive, in a bill full of big riffs and big songs, the Nashville trio whips out viciously short songs — some of which make Sex Pistols seem epic.
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