Live Review: Godspeed You! Black Emperor & Primitive Motion

Taking the coveted support slot, local elemental pop duo Primitive Motion are corralled into the corner of the stage due to the overflowing expanse of equipment laid out for the main act. This doesn't faze them, however – aided by vibrant visual projections, Leighton Craig and Sandra Selig show no signs of nerves. Selig's saxophone echoes over Craig's plaintive organ melody, a sense of naivety fuelling the attraction to these lo-fi wanderings. A multitude of instruments are utilised and exchanged, with the basic beats proving the backbone. The vocals aren't always defined, especially Craig's whose focus is more on sound than tone, and so it is to the credit of the sound engineer that the music doesn't seem dwarfed. At times a kitschy oddity, Primitive Motion resonate most when the musical palette is darker. An intriguing and ultimately appropriate precursor.

The crowd are incredulous at the fact they are seeing Canadian instrumental demi-gods Godspeed You! Black Emperor at all, yet the first fifteen minutes are jaw dropping. Looped effects dropping a cloak of ambient static bubbling and roiling across an empty stage, it is a coalescing drone that usurps most other sounds of its ilk – and the eight-piece haven't even presented themselves. When the band do take their places, with nary a word spoken, they launch into an incendiary set that reminds everyone why their sound is often emulated but never replicated. Sophie Trudeau's effects-laden violin is a constant source of aural amazement, while the punishing triumvirate of Efren Mennuck, Mike Moya and David Bryant on guitar continually turn each other inside out with their interwoven guitar lines. There's the dual percussive metronomes of Aidan Girt and Tim Herzog, while Mauro Pezzente and Thierry Amar tether the majesty together on both electric and stand-up bass. The highlights reside not only in the songs – Storm from Skinny Fists… is an epiphany – yet it is in the elements that create the whole. The films that accompany the set – images of manuscripts, microfiches, tunnels, rail tracks, burning film and overexposed images of buildings – elevate the nuanced atmosphere to euphoric levels; the brutal dirge attack of “new” track Mladic impresses with each build, another step in noise that was previously deemed impossible; the stately grace held in negotiating the calm before the apocalypse. So many elements go into crafting such an all-encompassing squall of sound that attention is perpetually arrested. Closing with a crushing rendition of Moya, the band roll out a miasma of noise and disappear once more into the shadows. Such a set may never be witnessed in Brisbane again – nor does it need to.