On Seeing Sleigh Bells and experiencing Liturgy, with a little bit of Diplo on the side

Tags: Aesthethica, Diplo, Firestone Live, Florida, Liturgy, live show, Orlando, Reign of Terror, Sleigh Bells

A line of people stretched down Orange Avenue, waiting to hear Sleigh Bell’s loud ruckus at Firestone Live last Friday night as rain beat down on them.

Doors were supposed to open at 10 p.m., but the venue was so packed that the line didn’t dwindle down until about 11 p.m. People just waited and waited in the rain as a bearded guy walked down selling ponchos at unreasonable prices. By the time everyone was inside and out of the rain, the opener, black metal “hipsters” Liturgy, had nearly already finished their set. And that’s too bad, because Liturgy had an . . . intriguing show.

Full disclosure: I loved Aesthethica, so I’m sure I have some sort of bias. But when Hunter Hunt-Hendrix and Bernard Gann stood up on stage in black T-shirt and jeans sans light show with nothing but two tremolo picking guitars and Hunt-Hendrix’s wailing vocals, it was a welcome experience of simplicity and sonic chaos. Liturgy played without the on-point drumming of Greg Fox, since he recently left the band, and they were also curiously without their bass player, Tyler Dusenbury. Instead, they replaced the drums and bass with electronics, and the result was an overwhelming wall of noise akin to the type of experience ragers want to experience with the rattling bass of a DJ. (Suddenly the Liturgy selection for the bill started to make sense.)

Still, so many show goers were waiting for the crowd-pleasing monotony of Diplo, and they certainly didn’t hide their impatience with Liturgy’s performance. One guy literally yelled in my ear, “This is fucking terrible, right?!” And I wanted to say, “No . . . no it’s not. Just let it happen.” A group of girls with “X”s on their hands right in front of me stood at the center of the stage and unabashedly flicked off Hunt-Hendrix and took a picture of their dainty little middle digits in front of the lead singer with their smartphones. I wanted to smack the phones out of their hands and tell them how rude that is to a performer no matter what you think of them, but cooler heads prevailed and I resorted to glares of disdain.

The crowd’s reaction to Liturgy was to be expected. There’s no denying or hiding the general abhorrence the public feels toward this band and its leading man—mostly due to the fact that they’re considered “pretentious” and Hunt-Hendrix even wrote a manifesto about what type of black metal music they play. But after hearing their record without knowing the back story at all (and especially after finally seeing them live), I can’t for the life of me understand how so much hatred could be garnered against them. We’re essentially angry over the fact that a person put more thought into starting a band than, ‘Hey, wouldn’t it be cool to be in a metal band?’ ‘Yeah, man, bands get laid all the time…’. Instead, here’s a band that wants to truly express themselves and manipulate the standards of a genre (regardless of whether or not it ever pans out), and we’re pissed because we don’t understand it or want to even put in the effort.

But for now, that’s everyone else’s problem and not mine. And of course, the show has to go on. So the set changed, and the dark blank stage suddenly filled up with towers of speakers and an American flag draped over the middle. Apparently Sleigh Bells were the first to play as co-headliners with Diplo.

Simply put in list format: their set was a mess of moshing, noise, bass, Alexis Krauss getting groped by the audience, bass, screeching guitars, sweat, and bass. “Chaos” would be an understatement, and no one can work a stage quite like Krauss. It was the first time I’d ever seen them play live, so personally, it was a treat. I’m shocked to say that Sleigh Bells’ energy level was almost higher than the crowd’s, and people were literally being trampled all around me. At one point, a large sweaty man came up to me and yelled in my ear, “Hey! Would you be pissed if we started a mosh pit?!” I shook my head, secretly thinking it would be funny to watch. But I found it interesting that I was even asked in the first place. Most mosh pits just suddenly happen. People don’t normally ask you if it’s okay. But I suppose that’s because most people coming to this show weren’t expecting to get a big sweaty man’s flying fist in their face.

This band has showmanship that I haven’t experienced in quite some time. Sleigh Bells recently had a photo shoot with GQ and you can see the type of confidence and eccentricity the two have. Krauss stepped down on a platform in front of the stage a number of times, got on her knees and let the audience run their hands through her hair and scream in her face as she serenaded back in their’s. It was all a little confusing and exciting. Was I at an ‘N SYNC concert in 1999 or was this noise pop fiasco Sleigh Bells?

Regardless—Krauss’s studded leather jacket, the hyper-speed double-bass drum machines, and the hair-metal-esque performance gave me the sense that Sleigh Bells just didn’t want to give anyone a break. And thank God they didn’t.

Oh, also, Diplo closed the night. Drugs, drunkenness, dancing and neon lights ensued. Surprisingly, I stood next to Hunter Hunt-Hendrix near the merch table in the back of the venue just as Diplo got on stage. I didn’t even realize it was him until I turned next to me and saw him bobbing his head just as the music started. I thought to myself, is he really bobbing his head to Diplo? Shouldn’t he be protesting this set on principle alone? And then I realized that that’s nearly as bad as those girls flicking him off to his face during his set. So I decided to bob along with him and see if I could let this DJ’s mish-mash of pop culture wash over me as well as Liturgy and Sleigh Bells’ did only moments ago.

–Dropped by Robert Miller
–Photos by James Dechert | FishToaster.com

Sleigh Bells:

Liturgy:

Diplo: