rsj pubrockfest gig review : 10th september 2007

22 hours of busride and i'd be mad as hell if this gig hadn't happened.

the lineup for the show is in itself an exciter, 13th hour, the baby of drummer jay (of pdv fame) zorran (ex guitarist of split) p-man (current bassist of pdv) and whatshisname, the vocalist were going to kickstart the set followed by *drumroll* split and then the superfuzz.

i reached the venue at 7 pm or so, and the soundcheck was just going on, so i managed to sneak in a few snaps of me at the soundboard looking all technical while staring at the pretty red buttons and took a few pics of zorran's (better known as "warren's brother") pedalboard, which is pretty kickass. the phaser is a pretty important pedal if you ask me, and if you don't ask me then you can go fuck yourself.

anyway, i was checking out the pedals before i was kicked out of razz and asked to come in again. which i did, only to realize that the soundcheck was still going on, apparently the superrfuzz drummer's tom's weren't sounding good. i'm talking about the drum-toms, fyi.

so, went out, ate leftovers from the subway tables and rishu managed to sneak me into the guestlist, and i'm hoping i don't owe him a hundred bucks.

so, the gig starts with 13th hour, the band was brilliant i tell you, in the short span of a month, they've developed with a bunch of kickass originals and well-nailed covers ranging from system of a down to mudvayne. zorran is indeed the riff master, very good stage presence, although the vocals were a bit of a turn off, the sound kept everything tight as hell.

then came split. onstage, watching them there after about a year was bliss. mel's switched to a couple of pedals instead of that huge-ass processor that he used to drag along, one's a marshall bluesdrive pedal and one's an xxl stompbox (if anyone knows what the hell a stompbox is, please tell me) aviv's still using the processor and the les-paul lookalike guitar, shakkar used a k-5 for the gig, the fieldy (from korn) signature guitar, and nigel was using the wooden drumsticks as usual (sorry, i don't know a lot about drum equipment)

their set started off with this song called "voice", brand new song it seems, i swear i didn't think garreth would play the harmonica on stage, but he did and they messed it up in the end, but since garreth already told us that they might, he is forgiven. the set progressed into "my house" which kicked ass, a wee bit different than the version found on the streams, i prefer this one, any day. garreth's vocals shone out, and so did mel's backup vocals.

there's something about this performance that was so grand, which is odd if we take the size of razz into consideration. i guess its the light that shines off mel's specks and gary's rings that makes it look like a pink floyd performance. i could have sworn i saw vishwesh in the crowd till i stopped swearing (?) and he took the mic and sang a bit of my-house from mel's mic. he then took mel's place to play "pig society" and nailed the riff for sure. a note to garreth, or whoever the band leader is, i can play the riff too :)

mel got his guitar back, gary announced the song of the night for me and the set progressed into the opening harmonic-driven riff of "holy ghost machine gun" which was the mosh-starter (too bad there were hardly any moshers in the crowd) and i have to admit, nigel nailed the beat into the ground, yes, luke kenny can go screw himself. i felt an inch taller during the duration of the song, maybe because i was standing on the monitor, which probably blocked off a lot of the stage sound (hehe) but the song was liberating, if you'd like to believe an under-statement.

zorran was the lucky bastard who got "fat oaf" dedicated to him and he was called on stage to play the song, which he did. looks like he remembers the riff still. there were a few sound problems with this one, since zorran's used to his single effects and not the processor and he had to keep fiddling with the volume control, but if you pressed your ear against the speakers it was easy to listen to :P

no aviv solos on that one, and the night went into the almighty "build higher" which rocked the set-list harder than it ever has. it almost stole the light from pig-society and holy-ghost-machine-gun, the sound was excellent, the riffs could be heard clearly and garreth's voice sounded sweeter than ever. then came the end of a relatively shorter set-list, the song "sometimes" and i hope this one's gonna be on the album, a perfect ending to a perfect, yet short setlist.

and now, the superfuzz got the stage, i have to admit, the bassist is quite tight, he has amazing grip and he can nail a good bassline, the drummer lacks consistency but is great with his beats and the guitarist is... well, i can find a good 20 similarities between him and some major rock acts from the grunge/post-grunge era.

the set was long, and entertaining, but i couldn't help but notice the similarities between his vocal style and that of jack white (the white stripes) especially in "what every kid wants", and lyrical similarities like in the song "school" which has a hook that screams "you're back in school again!" which is quite similar to "you're in high school again" by nirvana in the song (again) "school" and another song which has lyrics similar to "aneurysm" ("she gets it pumpin straight to my heart")

their set consisted of some very kickass covers in their punk rock avtaars, "no ordinary love" which is a sade cover with a heavy chorus effect, "john the revelator" which consists of a catchy riff and screams which happens to be a favourite of mine from depeche mode's new album "playing the angel" and ended with "jack the ripper", a white stripes cover.

great gig, ended with a great applause, although half the superfuzz setlist i was staring at girls near the bar (sorry, i'm getting used to the bangalore no-glam life, i couldn't help it) but i'm glad i came for this one, even thought it cost me a bomb :)

wouldn't miss a split gig for the world