Lightning Bolt at Brooklyn Monarch (photo by Kate Hoos)
One can’t possibly have a conversation about noise or experimental music without mentioning the pioneering duo, Lightning Bolt. They formed almost three decades ago in the wonderfully weird creative hotbed of Providence, RI and they’ve long been on the periphery of my consciousness (though not yet in the 90s, I wasn’t that cool as a teen).
My first introduction to them came in the form of a track on a stellar and very formative comp that came out in 2002 on the now defunct label, 5 Rue Christine (which at the time was an offshoot of Kill Rocks Stars devoted to putting out more experimental releases), If The 20th Century Didn’t Exist It Would Be Necessary To Invent It. That time period was sort of the end of the heyday of the cheap record label/zine comps where you could get 20-25 songs for a few bucks and discover all sorts of new shit to explore, perhaps even finding your new favorite band. It was always (and still is) supremely satisfying to strike musical gold this way, much more so than playlists are now or downloading random MP3s were during the same era. You got the “brand assurance” of knowing the label or zine releasing it so you could bank on the fact that it probably was good/well curated, but you still had to have a little skin in the game and make a bit of an investment which yeah, sometimes turned out to be a bust, but a lot of times it paid off in spades.
And pay off that comp surely did, I played that CD over and over again until it eventually got lost, but I never forgot the music I learned about from it. Today, it is available on KRS’ Bandcamp and I highly recommend you shelling out the five clams for it because it is still one of my favorites to this day. Or if CDs are more your thing, there are some cheap copies for sale on Discogs too.
Read Pitchfork’s review from when it came out. It doesn’t mention Lightning Bolt’s song but does highlight several other standout tracks and states “The Twenty-First Century is more of a starting point for further research than a complete picture of whatever scene encapsulates these bands,” and yeah, I can agree with that. That’s kind of the whole point of a comp like this to begin with.
Anyway, waxing nostalgic about great comps of yore aside, once I discovered them, it’s safe to say that Lightning Bolt was always there to form the soundtrack to some of my more high-strung moments and potent feelings, and I loved them for that. But something was missing because I somehow had never seen them live in all those years. I had heard that their shows were intense and sweaty affairs, played “in the round” with the audience encircling them (one of the best ways to see a band if you ask me). I longed put an end to my missing streak and finally got a chance to when they hit Brooklyn last week.
The Brians—Brian Gibson on bass and Brian Chippendale on drums and vocals—didn’t disappoint and their live set was everything I had heard to expect and more. The crowd immediately burst into a frenzy and I very quickly jumped up onto one of the speakers to hunker down with my camera for the show in a little makeshift photo pit of sorts as the duo pummeled the audience with song after song in a heavy noise barrage. Gibson remained stoic while Chippendale’s hands blasted out white hot rapid fire beats and his arms flew like an octopus around his drum kit (that looked ready to collapse at any moment and indeed, the bottom head of his snare drum broke within the first five minutes) to match his distorted and frantically echoing vocals.
Chippendale interacted with the audience several times, apologizing for having his coat on when he came on stage (the venue had a mandatory and very overpriced coatcheck), commenting on one person’s bootleg shirt (but saying he didn’t mind) and shutting down a tough guy who got too aggressive in an already harried crowd. Though a high strung evening, Chippendale kept the night light and fun with these interactions.
The show was opened by Detroit band Decliner who I unfortunately just missed as I walked in, and baby baby_explores, the Providence synth post punk band that had been on the duration of the tour with Lightning Bolt.
I admittedly was not in the best mood when I walked into the venue that night (dumb life shit) and it was a damp, cold night outside on top of it which wasn’t helping matters. But true to form, Lightning Bolt put a sound and a sonic vibration to how I was feeling and it was just the cobweb clearing I needed. After the show, the irritation I had felt about unrelated things faded away, quite literally rattled out of me by the noisey onslaught, and I felt a refreshed, cathartic energy as I stepped back out into the chilly night time air. That’s the power of longevity and the power of noise. And I’ll fucking take it.
Scroll down for video, pics of the show (photos by Kate Hoos)
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