Eyehategod
DVNE/GURT
THE UNDERWORLD, LONDON
NOLA SLUDGE LEGENDS HOLD ON TO THEIR CORE STRENGTHS
LONDONERS GURT [5]
are clearly chuffed to be sharing a stage with their heroes, but while they provide lolloping riffs and ‘Yo-oww-owwww’-lling vocals in spades, their fun-times stoner doom lacks substance. DVNE [5] are far more po-faced, peddling something heavy and proggy that combines Isis, Kyuss and Tesseract. With roving basslines, note-perfect warbles and carefully studied Rock God poses, the band know where they’re going, though they might want to dig around and find something of their own before they get there. That EYEHATEGOD [8] are still with us after 30 years of disaster and degradation is laudable, but their ability to remain so vital borders on the miraculous. What so many sludge copyists seem to forget is that Eyehategod are, at ruptured heart, a drug-mangled hardcore band, and cuts like Parish Motel Sickness or Sister Fucker owe as much to Black Flag or The Germs as they do Iommi and Osbourne. Grizzled guitarist Jimmy Bower casually chucks out milestone riffs without a backward glance while frontman Mike Williams expectorates vicious, pus-from-a-wound vocals. For a man who should be dead he looks remarkably spry, and while he might wrestle his mic stand like he’s rolling with punches he still takes time to josh the crowd between moments of weaponised feedback. The band make the pain they deliver look deceptively easy, but while the parts are primordial and the endorphin release of the slurred grooves transitory, the sense of strain, tension and threat behind it all remain a stomach-churning constant.
ALEX DELLER