One of the most amazing things about metal shows is the way many bands’ singers eschew any kind of proper interaction with the crowd.
They scream a song title into the mic, proceed with four minutes of aural assault and repeat. Itap like saying, “We’re not here to f*ck around and we just want to give you a heads up on what we’re going to play next.” That kind of no-nonsense approach mirrors the raw aggression of the music, reflecting an efficiency of both performance and musical tonality.
This is tactic, and on Tuesday at the it manifested a seamlessly quality to the Oakland, Calif. metal trio’s performance. Perpetually shirtless singer/guitarist Matt Pike, whose tight black pants were so low-slung there was an anxiety to the possibility of him moving his guitar too far to either side, growled a song title and the band played it, sludging through a list of tracks culled from ten years’ worth of the band’s songs.
The emphasis was, of course, on the group’s new disc, “Snakes for the Divine,” which came out in February, but High on Fire allowed all their material to meld together into one cohesive performance.
Except for one thing. Apparently the security at the Fox had celebrated 4/20 with a bit too much zeal, a fact that was funny when a renegade fan bounded across the stage during Priestess’s set, pumping his fist behind the guitaristap head as no one made any effort to constrain him.
But when the same fan leapt back onstage as the three members of High on Fire pummeled their way through one of their grungy metal numbers, careening around Pike and knocking him into his microphone, the reality was that the security employees at the Fox need a lesson in response time. Pike righted his mic and continued to howl into it, but when the song finished there was a little tear in the seamlessness of the show.
“I’m no pussy!” Pike snarled. “But you can’t come up here and smash someone’s head into their microphone. That shit hurt. I’m no pussy, though!”
He quickly barked another song title, but hearing a shirtless metal musician covered in tattoos tell you he’s not a pussy is like hearing a member of Vampire Weekend tell you they’re pretentious: Itap so obvious it doesn’t need stating. But Pike eventually regained his footing and continued roaring songs — titles and actual musical numbers — into his now-safe microphone as the crowd moshed before him. The real danger, he didn’t seem to realize, was in the positioning of his pants on his hips.
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Emily Zemler is a freelance writer and a regular contributor to Reverb. She also writes for Spin, Alternative Press, Relix and has a weekly column on where she forces musicians to talk about books.
Joshua Elioseff is a Boulder-based freelance photographer and regular Reverb contributor. Check out his .
