As far as large multi-day fests go, Psycho Las Vegas is still pretty wet behind the ears having only just had their fourth annual incarnation this August but already it has begun growing into what will likely continue to be the summer juggernaut of partying and music. New this year, to the dismay of many, was the location change from the off the strip and perfectly themed haunt, The Hard Rock Hotel and Casino, to the megaplex that is Mandalay Bay. Gone is the feeling of a true fest take over and in its place, a sprawling amalgamation of “psychos” and people from any town USA or abroad there simply to gamble, throw pre-wedding bashes, get drunk or maybe attend a conference (*ahem* “conference”). Once everyone got their bearings and navigated through this corporate mega casino/hotel/shopping mall, pushed back a few drinks or whatever preferred substances they were into, and found the locations of the four stages, the complaining ebbed and instead, people experienced the fest for what it is. A gigantic party with a great combination of bands playing for four days.Continue reading
Tag Archives: GSYBE
Godspeed You! Black Emperor Book Spring Tour Of The US For 2018
Godspeed You Black Emperor promo 2010
Post-rock legends Godspeed You! Black Emperor have booked a US tour for next spring. The band will be touring in support of their amazing recent release Luciferian Towers (Constellation Records). The band is expected to tour heavily in 2018, includign a stop at Roadburn Festival. All US dates are below.Continue reading
Godspeed You! Black Emperor – Total Life: Live at The Albert Hall, Manchester
The majestic confines of the Albert Hall play host to the enigmatic clandestine outfit Godspeed You! Black Emperor, on this hot spring evening. As the light fades through the elegant stained glass windows solo member drone act Total Life provide something of an endurance test. Devoting nearly an hour to all of three notes may be acceptable when the visual aspect of someone like Sunn0))) is in place, but when it is merely a chap crouched behind a guitar case, fiddling with a laptop and synth then the idea of watching paint dry becomes quiet an attractive alternative to this set of self-indulgent navel-gazing drudgery.
Enter Canada’s premier post rock export. Greeted in a suitably reverential fashion with polite applause lapsing into hushed anticipation the crowd seem grateful just to experience their heroes in such an opulent setting. Over the nine song set which follows Godspeed You! Black Emperor, are simply breath taking. Certainly the omission of numbers like ‘East Hastings’ may be an issue to some, but from the moment violinist Sophie Trudeau leads her colleagues into opener ‘Hope Drone’ the hall is lost in a reverie of wonder. Delivered against a backdrop of eerie projections, slogans such as ‘Out Of Order’ and ‘Fuck America’ appear, their antiauthoritarian rhetoric is absorbed in a far more accessible fashion than having it screaming right at you.
New opus ‘Asunder, Sweet And Other Distress’ is aired in its entirety veering from majesty to dissonant often savage territory. It is a brutal performance art piece where each composition is given its time in the spotlight. Trudeau and company encircled with their back to the audience, only acknowledge their adoring public following the conclusion of the set but to have babbled on between tracks would have spoiled the mood and detracted from the experience.
Two new compositions are aired tonight suggest that, whatever the future holds for this trailblazing octet it will be as mysterious and compelling as ever. Rightfully occupying their very own plain of existence, GYBE are already carving a new chapter in a legacy as compelling as it is unconventional.
ROSS BAKER