I Just Read About That…

[DID NOT ATTEND: March 24, 2024] Voivod / Prong / Traverse the Abyss / Black Horizon

Originally I was told that the opening band was War on Women and I was super excited to see them.  Indeed it was Voivod (who I love) and War on Women (who I’ve heard are amazing live) that made me consider getting a ticket.  I used to really like Prong a lot, but that was  thirty years ago and I had no idea they were still making music.   I actually can’t find any official word anywhere that War on Women was going to open, but I didn’t just make it up.  Anyhow, I received an update a couple of days ago that the openers were going to be Traverse the Abyss and Black Horizon.

And that changed everything.

I had been out the night before and it’s hard to get motivated to go out if you’ve been in a cozy house all day.

So, when I saw that one third of the reason I wanted to go was no longer there, it really made me rethink my plans.

I saw Voivod five years ago (it feel much more recent than that) and I would very much like to see the again, but that one show made a lasting impression on me.  I see that the setlist is quiet different than the last time, with a great amount of variety in the music, so it would certainly have been a good show.  But it didn’t feel compelling enough to drive all that way on a Sunday night.

I really liked Prong‘s Beg to Differ.  So much so that I drew a poster-sized version of the cover for my wall.  It’s possible that I followed them for a few more years after that, but when they went on hiatus I lost complete contact with them.  When they re-formed seven years later, there was only one guy left in the band.  And in fact it seems like no one spends more than a few years in the band.  I still like Beg to Differ and Tommy Victor’s voice is strangely compelling.  I’m sure I would have enjoyed their set, but I didn’t feel like leaving the house and driving all the way to Stroudsburg.

Traverse the Abyss is from Scranton (I was clearly in Scranton several decades too early).  They are a heavy heavy band with a very contemporary sound–lots of effects that border on electronic but aren’t.

The problem for me is that the lead singer sings like the guy from Avatar.  I like Avatar, but I don’t like when he sings in that kind of sleestak/monster voice.  It’s not a cookie monster rumble or growl, it’s really quite alien and horrible.  The Avatar guys does it too much, but the Traverse guy does it pretty much exclusively.  The weird thing is that the words are quite audible, which is very puzzling gven how inhuman he sounds.

Black Horizon is from Wiles Barre.  I listened to their EP on bandcamp and it sounds like one of shittiest indie metal albums from the mid 1980s.  It is so tinny and small.  It sounds like they recorded it in their basement.  And the lead singer sounds like he should be in a band more like Ministry–industrial rather than what this music is which is 100% classic heavy metal.

I say all the above and it sounds negative, but if I was in high school, this would have been my favorite record in the whole world.  The effects on the guitar are right up my alley.  The riffs, the breakdowns, everything makes me think that this is a lost album from 1987.