Nice'n'Sleazy, Glasgow
10/03/04
Having owned Art of the Black Earth for nigh on a year, it was a huge relief to finally get to see Macrocosmica live. Sure, I could argue with myself that I saw them play once in 1998, but it was different songs and a different band in reality. Nowadays they’re even more of a rock machine and ‘Art…’ is a stunning piece of work that I’m prepared to stand by for the long haul. Yet despite all the pressure that existed within my head for the band to live up to, Macrocosmica conquered all, performing three new songs as well as three album tracks.
Still, it’s hard to pinpoint their exact sound. They perform brutal and dark blasts of hard rock that don’t sound dated or clichéd, yet avoid latching on to any current rock trends or pitfalls. In one direction you have the huge riffs and screaming vocals reflecting a band like Monster Magnet, but in turn that meets at a crossroads with a Sonic Youth style, thanks to the intimidating, slower spoken word passages from Cerwyss O’Hare, and it’s an impressive combination.
Lead singer, Brendan O’Hare is generally more famous for his work with many other bands in Scotland that have shared levels of worldwide success, but when he’s onstage with Macrocosmica he’s a hyperactive blur, and this band deserves the recognition as much as any of their more successful peers.
Dundee’s Laeto on the other hand weren’t quite what I expected, but that wasn’t to the fault of the band. In my head they existed as a subtle post-rock band, and in reality they’re more about straight-out rock, so I spent their set trying to settle on what they really sounded like, which was possibly an incarnation of Cheap Trick subjected to a mysterious radiation dosage that had mutated them beyond any known level of humanity.
On the night, the power of the band did seem subdued, with the vocals and guitar solos not all coming through with the full clarity they appeared capable of producing, and as such, Laeto peaked during an instrumental number, which was blasted out with massive chorused riffs. Still, not a bad introduction to the band.
Something did click into place that night, though. Have you ever had two bands exist in the same slot in your brain because of their name, even although they sound absolutely different? Apparently I had been suffering this fate with Oneida and John Garcia’s Unida. Having previously heard Secret Wars, the music of Oneida was no surprise to me, but it was nice to solve the niggling puzzle in my mind of why they never quite sounded like I expect them to.
In many regards, they still don’t sound like you’d expect a trio to, but they produce a mightily powerful result, with rhythms just being spun around perpetually, the fuzzed bass completely filling the room, and the sounds of an organ being punched over and over to accentuate the horror. Sitting here a week after the event, I’m still slightly shocked by the sheer volume and impact the songs contained live, but I’d go back and face it again.
Steven McCarron
Photo: David Newitt
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