The Scala, London
29th May 2007
Part Chimp not only open with a big, metallic stoner rumble, they compound matters by using almost the exact riff from “Electric Funeral” to confirm that they are coming from a location somewhere between Black Sabbath and The Melvins. So then its heads down for an excercise in riffology, volume and mass squared by amplification, with the product being ringing ears and nodding heads. Under a gathering fug of smoke, spotlights and noise, it’s exactly like being blinded, deafened and punched in the thorax by bass and feedback – a singular experience, and one not without its enjoyable aspects, as Part Chimp ramp up the sludge factor and roll out the drums, mashing and slow-moshing with a dedication which is at once admirable and single-minded. Applause seems almost superfluous; a bit like congratulating a mountain for being impermeable and made of granite.
Comets On Fire sprinkle the introduction to their set with fractured springs of almost hushed guitars, soon boiling off into a throbbing spurt of pre-orgasmic skullblasting riffs and yelled utterances. The answer to the question “do they rock?” is not so much “yes” as “how much?” Substantially, might be a good start, or enough to wail and flail their way into the feedback book of records. The first half of the set doesn’t give much place to lyrics or melody, preferring instead to lumber from meandering squalls of analogue synth to slews of distended guitars. Why sing comprehensibly when some asynchronous headbanging explains the Comets On Fire experience so much better in this context? It’s a lot like having a head massage done with a food processor plugged into an amp – the layered churning exacting a heavy toll, with low end freqencies making the walls and floor heave in rhythmic sympathy.
The band are soon spewing out acid rock laced with methamphetamine, surging in waves onstage like some kind of speedball-powered grungy octopus, a hopped-up, maniacal Seventies-style trip of Altamont proportions gripping them as they heave their way to the stars. There’s some danger of losing dinner along the way, with fret-busting solos pulled writhing from the morass – just because they can – dripping with reverb and fuzzwah in ways that Messers. Fender and Gibson probably didn’t quite expect for their guitars to sound, while the synth has its controls twisted in implausible directions until shards of electronic ectoplasm drip out.
In the second part of the show, Comets On Fire bring about a gentler re-entry into earthbound pastures, an electric piano and cymbals shimmering the drop down into the relatively mellow Avatar material. With the emphasis on country-rock psychedelia, they’re still more than capable of ripping jagged holes in the cosmos, just in a more relaxed, laid back style, with the twin guitars soaring for the higher planes on a crest of good vibrations. But they can’t resist a return to the spasmolytic rocket-fuelled energy which brought the Comets into frenetic life tonight, frazzling the ears of the audience with malice aforethought for a finale which continues even after the house lights go up. If this were one of their festival appearances where the end of the evening didn’t involve buses home and venue curfews, the Comets could doubless keep this sort of distortion storm up well into the night. Instead, they ride their wave as far as will go until it crashes into oblivion. On the rocks, naturally.
-Richard Fontenoy-
