High On FireTonight's openers Shellfin are from Brisbane, but they sound like they wouldn't be out of place in the Mojave desert. Playing as a five-piece, the band's longer opening set allows them time to jam on some of the sun-kissed riffs and hard grooves packed into their Second-Hand Family record, while also showcasing some newer material.
Six months on from probably their best album yet – when they should have been touring the most – Oakland power-trio High On Fire's show at The Zoo tonight marks only the third set they have played in support of De Vermis Mysteriis. Instead of playing an American summer's worth of massive shows and reaping the rewards of their continued hard work with the band, High On Fire took a break to allow frontman Matt Pike time to deal with his addictions.
If the band were a little rusty after this break, you wouldn't know it by the time they plough into Frost Hammer. Even with the hindrance of Des Kensel's drums sounding a little flat in the mix tonight, High On Fire prove that they still have got 'the stuff'. Taking the set back to 2000's The Art Of Self Defense and presenting their stoner metal origins with a killer rendition of 10,000 Years before bringing it forward to the current-day style of gritty power-doom with Madness Of An Architect and Fertile Green – which Pike dedicates to 'the pot smokers' – the band show off their dexterity across a wide swathe of their material. They are equally adept playing slow and monolithic as fast and heavy, and the audience react with delight to each style that the band tries their hand at.
Every lyric Matt Pike delivers is not so much sung, nor is it simply screamed, but rather bellowed. Like a general leading a charge into a battlefield, each stanza feels like another compelling call-to-arms. Pike's rousing vocals are simultaneously terrifying and electrifying as he works through some of the mighty refrains throughout numbers like Devilution and Snakes For The Divine. And the crowd are hanging on the frontman's every word, pumping their fists along with each epic verse and chorus. It's only when Pike's vocals drop away that the devoted up at the front of The Zoo can start up wild circle pits at the insistence of Kensel and Jeff Matz's Motörhead-styled biker rock rhythm section.
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It feels like a mystery as to why the set doesn't include the massive title tracks from Blessed Black Wings and Death Is This Communion but, apart from this niggling concern, the only other question on the minds of punters as they file down The Zoo's stairs seems to be, “When will these guys be back in the country?”
