HEALTH @ Brudenell Social Club Leeds, 4th May 2008

HEALTH weren’t the headliner for reasons unknown, but they where the stand out act by a long long way. Before I gush about them the other acts where: Randomnumber, the opener which was a guy playing a laptop set of pure noise. He was quite enjoyable in a nose bleeding sonic assault kind of way. My favourite moment was when the static and white noise was playing full whack and old guy wondered in with a walking stick and ignored everything, headed right for the toilet. Two Minute Noodles where up next, they sounded a bit like half of Battles and Half of Fulborn Teversham joining forces and playing sea-side organ tunes. I was half expecting rocking versions of Thomas The Tank Engine. Joking aside though, they weren’t bad at all. The drummers rock antics of pointing to the crowd with drumsticks where priceless. Next on were HEALTH, but I will get back to them very soon. So I come to the headliner act for tonight Zombie Zombie, they hail from Paris and make some kraut rock style synth rock. They had a really touch job of following HEALTH, as Zombie Zombies music was passive in comparison. They would have been at home if they played before them, yet shit happens so lets move on. Zombie Zombie played some good tunes that some times sounded like old RPG computer game music with dance-rock drums. My sources tell me one tune was a version of a tune on Final Fantasy VIII. There was much yelping and echo drenched vocals in a French drawl. To be fair it was nice to chill out after the intense HEALTH.

Now onto my main event of the night HEALTH: Where to start with this brilliant LA band, which comes from The Smell. I’m sure you know what that is by now no? Well maybe I will explain later, lets just say No Age and The Mae-Shi also come from there for now. HEALTH jumps into action and take everyone by surprise with the first of many beastly beats. I saw people actually jump out of their skin, amazing scenes. The tribal drums are something else live I was in awe of the drummer. The intensity was only matched by the creativity and pure power. It’s hard to put HEALTH into words they are that good and out there. They produced there record live perfectly, everything they do they do live, each sound you hear is made in front of your very eyes. The band jump from instrument to FX peddle to drums and guitar, everything was used to full effect. I loved the use of ramming microphones into speakers and drums to make insane hums of sound. Half the time half of HEALTH where on their hands and knees smacking out some serious noise on instruments unknown. It was a joy to watch and the best live experience I have seen in a long time. Those drums, hell its like a beast is coming at you, a thought we were under attack from Dinosaurs. They even treated us to at least one new song, which was amazing to say the least. It featured some dance synth that got the crowd moving, and a screaming vocal effect that sent shivers down your spine. It featured a ascending noise shooting quickly right after a vocal scream, that merged into some beastly beats, wow! HEALTH as you may have noticed impressed me a whole lot go and see them live ASAP, get their records and T-shirts too. I was feeling ill as hell and HEALTH was a perfect cure.

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