White Hills and Arobrot- The Lexington, London 3/24/12

White Hills have just released their new record, Frying on this Rock, which I will review soon (and is really cool) and are doing a pretty big Europe tour but sadly not coming to Denmark. I was lucky to be able to catch the Deviants and White Hills in one weekend! I had listened to this Norwegian noise metal band Arabrot on the internet and it was pretty wild and crazy stuff but I never really got into it much. Intense for sure, so I was not sure if I would like them live or not.

          The show was sold out and really packed with people (holds 200). Sue and I met up with Michele from the Atomic Workers again and he was kind enough to bring me some of their music that I did not have. I also met Alan Last, who I had not met in years despite us exchanging many mails. Nice to see some people I know, I spoke briefly to the White Hills folks and they were in a great mood.

         

          The Lexington was a really cool place. It was very American downstairs and they served 20 different American beers like Sierra Nevada, Sam Adams, Anchor Steam, Blue Moon, Brooklyn Lager, etc… Nice décor. The upstairs had a couple of levels and we had a sofa almost dead center upstairs so we had a perfect view. This was the second night now where the clubs have no one to do lights so it was just the same all night long. Too cheap to hire someone, I guess? IT took a while for it fill up. The Norwegian band hit the stage at 20:45 (late for London!) and were damn intense.. Just a three piece with bass, drums and guitar and it was fucking loud. The bass player also had a floor tom that he would beat at times. The music was a wall of sound, like an angry Melvins meets dÿse but not as complex. Both the drummer and the guitar player shared screaming irate vocal parts. I filmed a couple of tracks and the first one was the best track they played an actually very cool and had more dynamics. They got a good crowd response and they had some super heavy tracks but it was a bit much for me in the end. They ended their set with just drums (bass player also playing) and the guitar player just singing,

Set List: Holes, Nubile, Wheels, Valkyrie, Madonna is a whore, Scag Cat, Dolorous, AUU, Solar Anus

          White Hills have to change out the cymbals and set up a lot of pedals but got ready pretty fast. I had never seen Dave use so many. I have to say this concert was way too loud. It was fucking deafening! Over 115db on my phone db meter! Great sound but too loud. They played half of the new record and some of the songs you would expect but a pretty fresh set and mostly high intensity space rock. They had some pre-recorded intro and spacey sounds that started and ended some tracks, since they don’t have anyone to make all those spaced out sounds live like they have on their CDs. The new songs sounded amazing live especially Robot Stomp with this really intense repeated bass line. Great song,. See the video below. They had a set list on the stage but there was no chance for me to get it so I am not sure exactly what was played. They opened with Path of Light. The encore was quite long and spaced out. The audience was into it and Dave said that London was always great. A fun night but my ears were really ringing and I even wore earplugs. I did not think bands were aloud to play that loud anymore? Great night…

Set List: Intro, Path of Light, Radiate, Skin, Song of Everything, You Dream, Robot Stomp, Condition, Peace of Mind, H1-P1