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Date -
09/10/04 |
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| Readers' score - None |
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Pitchshifter / Sikth
@ Nottingham Rock City
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| SIKTH. |
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Sikth are proper. As they power through their hyperkinetic bonkers math metal it's hard to make out any of the melodies that make them reasonably accessible on record, but the six-piece's sheer determined heaviness is so appealing that you barely notice. With two convincingly gnarly singers bouncing their "Evil Mutley" vocal stylings off one another and stomping and growling all over the stage with gusto, the focal point is sorted - handy because the rest of the band make no attempt at pretending to be anything other than the Iron Maiden-shirted metal nerds they clearly are. But this means they're able to concentrate on the more important business of making their guitars go "bliddleniddleniddlebliddlenid dlebliddleniddleescreeeeeeeee" and making the drums go "THUDDadudda THUDDaduddaTHUDDaduddaDUDDADUDDA". And Christ knows which are the old songs and which are the new ones, but to be honest no-one really seems to be paying that much attention to what they're actually playing - all those tattooed, black-haired young whippersnappers in the front are merrily kicking the shit out of each other instead.
PITCHSHIFTER
Pitchshifter have always been a funny band to try and explain. On paper their hybrid of drum n bass, metal, punk and industrial should have made them the most perfectly devastating outfit on the planet, but somehow it almost always seemed to fall short. Up until the end of their career they were criticised for not having the tunes, and then suddenly when Deviant appeared crammed full of tunes, everyone realised that tunes don't actually suit them so well. J S Clayden's disgusted sneer sounds best over a wall of white noise, a la "Genius", rather than tied on to some clunky nu-metal riffs.
Which makes it all the stranger that four of the first five songs Pitchshifter play are from Deviant (the fifth, "Eight Days, is even newer). But it also fits their defiance - they may have broken up, but they're making it clear this wasn't because of anything they were doing wrong. And seeing them onstage, it's hard to remember exactly why they did break up. The near capacity venue is pretty much full of loyal fans who know at least half their back catalogue, and the band onstage are lean, tight and full of cheerful aggression. They don't look like a band who are breaking up - they look like a band who announced their break-up and then changed their mind. This tour is supposed to be in support of a new DVD, but I suspect there's more to it than that. I don't think Pitchshifter are ready to give it up just yet. They've still got things to say (in their typically righteous way they've brought animal rights campaigners PETA with them on tour), and they've still got people there to listen to them.
Considering this is their final tour (again), and considering Nottingham is (as Clayden proudly declares) where they're from, the night seems robbed of its sense of occasion. The band don't play it up - they don't say any farewells, don't even play an encore, and even the t-shirt bootleggers on the street seem a bit lacklustre. No-one really seems to believe that this is the last we'll see of Pitchshifter.
And hopefully it won't be. They play a storming gig. The guitars were a little quiet and fizzy compared to the roaring drums and vocals, but tracks like "Hidden Agenda", "Please Sir" and "Mircrowaved" are heavier than songs that danceable have any right to be, and still ten times better than anything the Prodigy ever managed. It's not time for Pitchshifter to give it up yet. Lets hope they realise that.
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| Tom Pegg |
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