GOJIRA – Oslo – Parkteatret
- Posted on 30-10-2012
So, it was one the most sold-out concert in Oslo this year, and I guess all the attention Gojira (FR) has gotten in the mainstream press for their L’Enfant Sauvage album (2012) might explain the interest for gig this evening. It was sold out for months, and people without tickets were randomly roaming the streets.
Gojira have put out a couple of really nice albums over the years, so now they’re hooking up with Roadrunner for their first real match for the world championship in Metal.
I mean, these guys have a real chance of becoming an insanely big band in the Metallica-sense of the word: They play fairly catchy metal, its compact and sometimes punishing and relentless – but they do appeal to fans outside the hardcore gravedesecrator church-burning segment.
Anyways, Gojira brought two other French metal acts with them for this tour, but the metal varm-up party hosted by Den Slemme Sekta (c)(tm) spun out of control, so the hours passed quickly. I entered the venue just in time to see the t-shirt merch for the support bands, and I might
have heard some guy yell "good night, motherfuckers" or something from the stage. Fair enough. The equipment that the roadies cleared off stage looked vicious.
The Gojira merch stand was stiffly priced with your-average set of items: T-shirts, mainly, with a merch-guy yawning his way through this evening here in Oslo, the heart of darkness at very outpost of Europe/planet Earth.
Gojira took stage at midnight, but failed to cash in the obvious necro/death puns available, but that ok, I guess. They waved to the audience cheering, and strapped up with their equipment. The chugging chords and schrieking Gojira-copyrighted guitar slides was promptly presented. The sound was a bit sketchy, but they adjusted accordingly by the second song.
I mean, I like Gojira, ok? But its possible to get slightly pacified by the machine-gun riffing and metal vocals in the long run. And if you’re into music that elaborates more on Satan, Armageddon, puke & tits & metal escapism – Gojira is probably not the best candidate. Perhaps in a positive manner: Gojira clearly promotes environmental issues, like save-the-planet-stuff, the daily business of that whale activist Paul Watson, energy consumption, and quirky ways of pondering about existential do-and-dont’s(death, life, etc). Intricate stuff with strange spelling. So, I don’t quite get it when the hordes of drunk people here this evening pour their beer over their heads and raise their arms with alcohol-marinated hails&horns gestures. It does not make sense in this context. I struggle to find anything Gojira-stuff that +1 Satan/Devil/etc. They’re not religiously hostile, in the metal sense of the word.
But hey, if people wanna waste beer and do metal hails, I don’t care, what the fuck, as long as they’re happy. I just don’t get it, though.
The Setlist, I think:
Explosia
Flying Whales
Backbone
The Heaviest Matter of the Universe
L’Enfant Sauvage
The Art of Dying
Wisdom Comes
Toxic Garbage Island
Oroborus
Clone
The Axe
Vacuity
—
The Gift of Guilt
Songs like Backbone, Heaviest Matter (…), and Art of Dying, and Orobourus clearly builds the case that Gojira are dead tight and well-playing together, there is simply no bullshit detectable no matter how you twist and turn it. I mean, that L’Enfant Sauvage riff is catchier than most venereal diseases. And it worls. That drummer guy, Mario Duplantier, really comes off as diabolically skilled and totally tripping on precision and power. He’s rock solid. End of discussion.
The rest of the band should also have credit for the fact that they seemed to like playing, still hungry, sort of, keen to make the songs shine in this concert setting.
Slight changes were done to the songs to speed up and build energy , and it certainly worked. These guys are pro’s, I d argue, and probably one of the best live bands humping around these days.
The last year, Gojira have done support gigs for Metalica, Slayer, and Lamb of God, just to mention a few – playing stadiums bigger than Oslo City (the actual city, not the shopping mall), so I guess it’s the last time anybody will see a band this big play in such a small venue.
Due to logistical issues, I had to bolt somewhere around halfway through the set – but according to my metal-scholar friends – this was the real deal.
Then again, they were all to drunk to copulate. Who knows how this was?
Thanks to Black-Magic Braathen for organizing a ticket for this!