Strung Out (photo: Diana Rowley)
By Jeff Rowley
Like usual, Strung Out hit the stage abruptly and intensely. Their incredibly fast, tight, heavy and technical sound didn’t lose anything in the changeover from album to live; they were like some sort of melodic hardcore/metal machine. With this many years under their belts, mistakes and amateur slip-ups are behind the Simi Valley, CA band.
Being a bit of a Strung Out aficionado, this was good to see, considering I know how many problems they’ve had with sound in the past in Vancouver. Out of the 21 years I’ve been listening to Strung Out I have only missed two shows in Vancouver and, sorry to say it, but 50 percent of those times the sound was crap. It was the band’s killer music that kept me coming back year after year.
This time out the band had a different strategy; keep the volume down a little bit. It wasn’t overly loud and you could almost talk to the guy beside you comfortably. This way you could hear every instrument clearly. The sound hadn’t been this good since the Blackhawks over Los Angeles tour came through Vancouver in 2007 and the band played the now-defunct club Richards on Richards.
But back to the show: the set list interesting and they cut out a lot of the old classics this time around. Out of my five or six must-hear songs at a Strung Out show, I only got one: “Her Name in Blood.” Choosing not to play “Calling” was off-putting, because it’s their best song. The smaller turnout was also surprising, but you could blame that on the fact that it was a Sunday night. The majority of the people at the show were in their late thirties or older and didn’t seem to be totally up on the band’s new material, especially their brand-new album, Transmission.Alpha.Delta. This was evident when lead singer Jason Cruz held the mic out for the audience to sing some key parts and they didn’t know the lines.
But the show was top notch, and for newer fans of the band there was nothing more they could have asked for.
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