[ATTENDED: March 16, 2023] Unwound
This Unwound tour was announced with much fanfare. It had been 20 years since the band had last toured. And they didn’t think they’d reunite
“When we put Unwound on the shelf in 2002, we never thought we’d return to the project,” drummer Sara Lund said in a statement with today’s announcement. The band held its first reunion practice, secretly, in April 2022.
but
“Starting over again is a rebellious act against our failure,” guitarist/singer Justin Trosper added.
There was a compounded problem in that their bassist Vern Rumsey, died in 2020. When introducing the last few songs of the night (the only time he spoke) Trosper dedicated the finals songs to Vern saying that he was the soul of the band. Jared Warren filled in for Rumsey. Scott Seckington has also joined on guitar–the band was (pretty much) always a three-piece, but I thought Seckington was an excellent addition to the overall sound.
But it turned out that the early 1990s band that I was familiar with was Unrest. Indeed, I didn’t know Unwound at all. But I had grabbed a ticket because the hype got the best of me. I listened to their albums and really liked what I heard. So I wasn’t disappointed that I got the ticket.
There was the usual pre-band music playing over the speakers, but about five minutes before the band went on, the sound was switched to a live broadcast of NOAA weather–a perfectly weird sounding recitation of ordinary weather information. It worked perfectly. The also played the NOAA weather when the band was over.
So the band came out and started with a quiet guitar intro. Earlier I heard some young folks asking each other if they were going to mosh. This intro didn’t seem very mosh friendly. But after about a minute, “All Souls Day” quickly turned into a pounding thrashing song with all kinds of harsh guitars and screamed vocals. The mosh pit started immediately.
Before one of the songs, Lund thanked the young people–people who probably weren’t even born the last time they’d played Philly–for the youthful energy. And they were there in quite a large mass. But not large enough to make a huge pit–we olds were not about to jump into that, so I could stay pretty close and not get pushed around.
I really enjoyed watching Seckington who was making all kinds of interesting sounds–I wasn’t clear if he and Trosper were playing the same thing as I couldn’t really see Trosper’s guitar. I think most of the time they played similar parts, but when they diverged, the chaos was amazing.
Despite the very loud and noisy components of the band, they did have some melodic and quieter moments–like in the beginning of “Hexenzsene.”
I loved the circular feel both in guitar and in overall feel for “Look a Ghost” (one of only two song they played from their last album). This song was much more mellow–it sounds like that might be the direction they were heading. But that was not the direction of this show.
Because “New Energy” just blasted out from The Future of What–two minutes of sharp guitar sounds and screamed vocals.
All of the songs had interesting parts to them. “Usual Dosage” was a roaring wild song, but it had a middle section in which Warren played high notes (and harmonics) on the bass while the rest of the band kept a circular melody going.
I absolutely loved the main riff to “Laugh Track” a weird, disjointed yet catchy melody that subsides for some really harsh guitar chords later on. “Corpse Pose” had a similarly cool looping main riff. I liked that this one was offset by immediate sharp chords.
“Scarlette” felt like it was going to be an instrumental–kind of grooving and catchy for over two minutes. Although once the lyrics came in, it was still quite harsh. But it did work as a nice breather.
The show was broken into two sets. I thought it was an interesting plan for the band. They still played for about 90 minutes, but they got to have a little breather in between.
Just as they started the set with three songs from New Plastic Ideas, they ended the first set with two songs from The Future of What. Throughout the night I was really blown away by Lund’s drumming. It wasn’t crazy, but it was unconventional. “Disappoint” featured some cool moments of drum patterns that propelled the song with rhythmic toms while keeping the beat steady. I was also impressed with how loud and crisp the drums were too. She didn’t look like she was hitting all that hard (although maybe she was) or it was just mic’d perfectly.
They ended the set with “Swan” which started noisily but not to harshly. But it quickly turned into a wall of noise with fast drums circular guitars and lots of screaming. This song ran to almost ten minutes, especially when the ending–a wall of drones and feedback stretched out to over three minutes.
The band took a fifteen minute break “don’t go anywhere… except to the bathroom… or the merch table… or the bar.” During that time they were playing some crazy retro-sounding organ music which I learned later was part of the bonus CD only tracks that came on The Future of What. Three tracks titled : “Excuse Me…” “… But Pardon …” “…My French” are a 4 minute, 2:45 minute and nearly 7 minute loop of this organ melody. It’s a weird bonus track and it was kind of a fun thing to play during the intermission. I kind of wish I had checked out the merch instead of hanging onto my spot because the tall lads moved in once the music settled.
Set two was given up almost entirely to their debut album Fake Train. Of the seven songs, five were from that album. And despite the fact that that album is very heavy, it also felt like this set was an opportunity for them to stretch out and jam a bit more with several of the songs lasting almost ten minutes.
The band came back and played the two note introduction to “Dragnalus” and the crowded lurched into a stomped slow dance. There was lots of cool screaming in this one, too.
“Nervous Energy” opens with soft drums, quiet guitars a gentle pulsing harmonics. It was one of the quieter songs of the night–until the end when it just took off for about a minute before fading into “Arboretum,” another relatively slow and quiet song that they really seemed to enjoy quietly jamming out on. Things stayed rather quiet for “Lady Elect.”
The last three songs returned to Fake Train and “Valentine Card” nearly blew the roof off with the wild screams. The bass line of “Kantina” continued the joy as the harmonic laden riff took the song in different direction from the noisy chords that followed.
The ended the night with “We Are and Was or Is” which opened with some gentle percussion–Lund was playing the cymbals with little rattling percussion things–while the guitars were playing this lovely melody. Like at the end of the first set, the band jammed this out and then played some wild exercises in feedback while Lund returned to the gentle percussion.
While the guitars were feedbacking, the band threw the flowers that were on stage out into the crowd. It was a surprisingly tender gesture for a band who practically knocked the building over.
I wasn’t sure if I wanted to go to this show earlier in the week, but I’m so glad I went, I’m a new Unwound fan, only 20 years after they broke up.
| 2023 | |
| SET ONE | |
| All Souls Day Θ | |
| Envelope Θ | |
| Hexenzsene Θ | |
| Look a Ghost ⇔ | |
| New Energy ¿ | |
| Usual Dosage Θ | |
| Laugh Track ⊗ | |
| Corpse Pose ≅ | |
| Scarlette ⇔ | |
| Disappoint ¿ | |
| Swan ¿ | |
| [loop recording of Excuse me… But Pardon… My French] ¿ | |
| SET TWO | |
| Dragnalus ⊄ | |
| Nervous Energy ⊄ | |
| Arboretum Θ | |
| Lady Elect ≅ | |
| Valentine Card ⊄ | |
| Kantina ⊄ | |
| We Are and Was or Is ⊄ | |
⊄ Fake Train (1993)
Θ New Plastic Ideas (1994)
¿ The Future of What (1994)
≅ Repetition (1996)
⊗ Challenge for a Civilized Society (1998)
⇔ Leaves Turn Inside You (2001)
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