Given its name, Club Dada in Deep Ellum was a fitting venue for Primitive Man’s American Observance tour, which boasted one of the most unique lineups I have seen at a non-festival show. The leg of the tour that I caught featured three acts supporting Primitive Man: God is War, a power electronics artist from LA; Today is the Day, a cult classic experimental metal band from Nashville; and Buffalo Nichols, a solo blues guitarist from Houson. Primitive Man, of course, is a three piece outfit from Denver that performs in a genre of their own invention: death sludge. The unorthodox lineup complemented the singular aura of mystery and darkness that the headliner embodies without seeking merely to replicate the band’s sheer heaviness.
God is War kicked off the night’s performances with a mix of confrontational visuals and abrasive, arrhythmic undulations of sound. As a projector beamed smart phone images of undignified street fights and wild animals goring their young on the wall behind him, the solo performer hunched over his laptop and patch cable board to conduct a linear progression of crushing and self-disintegrating loops.
Today is the Day followed God of War, bringing to the lineup the more structured approach of a three piece rock band but maintaining the ethos of evil at the core of both musical projects. The band’s songwriting takes cues from no-wave and post-punk in that the instrumentation allows each track to develop its own equally unsettling and groovy atmosphere. Frontman Steve Austin embodied a dementedly dead-pan rockabilly persona, saying things like “sadness will prevail” with an air of wizened sincerity but also tongue-in-cheek madness like he was the ghost of Elvis.
By far the most out-of-left-field addition to the night’s lineup was Buffalo Nichols, a solo performer whose music was easily the lightest fare of the night. The lone musician’s take on the blues experimented with the genre as much as every other act experimented with their respective genres, though, lending a sort of logic to his addition to the bill. Using ambient effects pedals, Nichols created blues songs that sounded like lamentations from the future. Other tunes in his repertoire took a more straightforward approach to the blues, but Nichol’s unique, brassy voice and earnest performance kept the music his own throughout.
Primitive Man vocalist and guitarist Ethan Lee McCarthy introduced his headlining band in a meek, kind-sounding voice, saying, “Thank you for coming,” before proceeding to play the most unmeek, unkind-sounding set I have ever seen at a concert. McCarthy’s guitar shrieked with feedback along with Jonathan Campos’ enormous, clanking bass tone and Joe Linden’s precise drumming. Said drums kept a brutally slow tempo throughout most of the band’s droning songs, but would speed up to a galloping crescendo for a crushing interlude of organized chaos.
By far the most captivating part of the show was McCarthy’s powerful vocal performance. Rage-filled growls and tortured shouts punctuated the band’s cacophonous rumble. There was something mesmerizing about the intensity of the performance, something that held me in Observance of the menacing spectacle, as the title of the band’s latest LP and the tour implies.
