Allthough it started over an hour after announced time it was well worth the wait. Guys from the band were talkative and friendly, they set up stage in front of the stage close to an audience and they were so well played in and rehearsed it was raptutous to watch them play. Sound was set up loud, real loud, and there were few objectioners in the audience but in my opinion it was not over the top. Also, albeit loud, sound was crystalline clear - ringing clear - with a warm ting that was very distinctive and pleasurable to listen to.
Cinematic grindcore sounded like an interesting concept while I was browsing through their work on Last.fm and I am very pleased I went to see and hear that because I feel that Graf Orlock have successfully wed two of my great loves - punk and movies. I especially liked the fact that there were no visual cues to this parade. As opposed to recent Meniscus gig in same venue, which had a lot of visual material to accompany the music making it a crossover experience modality-wise, this gig and its auditory directiveness was refreshing and vivacious, grabbing attention from the very start and making this experience intense and personal. In fact, it was so personal that I stood there grinning and taking pictures and tapping and hopping and enjoying the moment so much it resembled the experience of "being churched" (you can read about that on this great Virtual Church of The Blind Chihuahua: What is Church, Anyway? page or if in need of more scientific explanation here are some notes on limbic resonance).
Which brings me to next logical point - Why do I go to "real" punk concerts anyway? I do not listen to that much grindcore or hardcore or any kind of punk exclusively. I dabble in indie and enjoy piano driven Japanese nu-jazz post-rock. WTF?
Well, no indie Japanese post-jazz gives me the feeling of joie de vivre and absolute invigor'ation punk gives. When I stand there and listen to punk musicians, as good as those four were last night, play, my consciousness is wiped clean of everything except pure joy. All I feel is happiness, destructive wonderful happiness, sexually arousing exculpating happiness, violent and deafening happiness pure as the blood that runs through all our veins. No white, black or yellow, no straight or queer, no vegan or kosher, no inprisoned or free. It does not cross boundaries, it negates them. There is no "do". Only "be".
It is such a wonderful and liberating feeling, hologramic, wholesome,.. like being a cell and Consciousness Embodied simultaneously.
Here you can sample some of Graf Orlock work and by all means do support artists by buying their stuff.
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