2023-10-20 14:52:05
„The Time for Art is Over“? Algiers are on tour supporting their difficult, contentious fourth studio album Shook also in Orpheum Extra Stop – and ensure clear fronts.
However, the start of the evening is first done by the Viennese duo, which has an attempted brutal name Halal Hardcorewhich at least fits as support due to its polarizing effect.
Why those FM4-suitable combination of unoriginal, thumping modular beats and constantly changing guitar lines, garnished with sporadic slogan singing, which is perhaps satirically meant to be hipster Dadaism rooted in pop, but can generate a certain goodwill among large parts of the audience understand. The fact that you can get sick during the almost half-hour set is probably primarily due to the pungent smell of incense in the fairly well-filled room Orpheum Extrabut from a subjective point of view there is practically nothing positive to say regarding the performance, despite the high tolerance limit when it comes to ambivalence.
In the meticulously organized, seemingly randomly compiled setlist chaos from all of their albums (around the ambivalent current one that is in focus Shook) to brush Algiers then the attitude of refusal that she has had since becoming a hit in 2017 The Underside on Power (which of course still has a fixed place at the center of the evening, albeit as an archaic interpretation beyond the apocalyptic choir soul – albeit because Lee Tesche’s guitar is pretty much lost in the mix, at least in front of the stage) in a downright missionary manner, on the current tour a provisional zenith: that of Shop Talk-Bassist and merch guy Tristan Griffin, a quartet that has expanded into a quintet at times, spreads out the rocky, catchy moments like A Good Man only sporadically inserts itself into a sometimes unwieldy conglomerate of rap, industrial or post-punk adjustment screws and stages itself (already with a pretentious or philosophical attitude) in the genre melting pot as a multimedia accelerator.
Always making sure that the curtains around the stage area remain closed so as not to draw attention away from the performance, which is accompanied by a precisely coordinated video show (yes, actually!), Franklin James Fisher, for example, makes sure to put on a pointed display with a headscarf and sunglasses Coolness, loops his vocals not only for the jam finale of Death March and leaves the scene behind the screen to remove his persona to a certain extent from an equation that the guest features of Shook integrated as samples, but doesn’t lose the toothpick in the corner of his mouth for the entire hour and a half of the performance (and the serene poker face only breaks into a big grin when Griffin uses his microphone stand to project Backxwash straightens out).
While the one in the fishnet shirt and evening slippers has no interest whatsoever Silent Alarm-Legendary status apart from masterly flashes of competence (in the symbiosis of virtuoso fidgeting cymbal playing and almost raw power on the toms), Matt Tong, who is just laconically flexing his muscles, is completely opposite in the behavior of Ryan Mahan, who is excessive, eccentric and in a transparent shirt extroverted like Schmitt’s cat, with gestures ranging from rave Vikings to awkward push-ups in his exuberantly hopping expressive dance repertoire, and sees the socio-politically driven songs as a hedonistic expression of physicality: a quite surprising contrast between critical distance and uninhibitedness.
In an artistically holistic stream, individual moments only stand out to a limited extent, but the representatives of the self-titled debut in particular gain enormous presence in the current outfit, for example Blood mutated into a dystopian chain gang gospel with martial gravity or that was fueled by clapping Black Eunuch as a catharsis finale even more than the title track, which is splendidly ignited in stages There is No Year (2019) is growing more and more intensely: The current incarnation of Algiers only work to a limited extent, but in live form the band’s evolution is coherent, compelling and fascinating, and has a captivating added value.
What in this specific case culminates in an evening that can ostensibly fail because of one’s own expectations – or can exceed them in an exciting way.
Setlist (without guarantee):
Irreversible Damage
Cry of the Martyrs
Irony. Utility. Pretext.
73%
Walk Like a Panther
Blood
The Underside of Power
I Can’t Stand It!
Cold World
Out of Style Tragedy
A Good Man
There is No Year
Bite Back
Death MarchEncore:
Black Eunuch
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#Algiers #Halal #Hardcore #18.10.2023 #Orpheum #Extra #Graz
