Textures & The Ocean – Academy 3, Manchester – 27th November 2011 (Live Review)
Monday, 05 December 2011
Written by Ben Bland
Sadly even the arrival of two of Europe’s most acclaimed metal acts hasn’t quite stirred Manchester’s metal populous to fill up Academy 3 on this chilly Sunday evening. Neither of these bands are regular headliners in this country and sadly it is hard to see how they will become so if metal fans don’t even bother for a show that brings them both together. The smallest Academy venue, this half-full show is desperately disappointing.
Manchester’s own Aliases have tagged on for the ride. A new vehicle for ex-SikTh man Graham ‘Pin’ Pinney, sadly the quintet can only provide the coldest djent by numbers you could imagine. Technically adept metal need not be so heartless, but nobody seems to have told this band. The songs are practically non-existent and everything is just a bewildering series of polyrhythms and eye baffling guitar work. Where Pinney’s old band had character, Aliases have none.
The Ocean (small pic) released one of the finest metal albums of the twenty-first century when “Precambrian” dropped in 2007. Last year they were a bit hit and miss with their “Heliocentric” and “Anthropocentric” releases but on stage this band are absolutely killer. The sound may vary hugely depending on where one is standing but the sheer energy displayed by these post-metal behemoths is more than enough to make up for it. Vocalist Loïc Rossetti makes at least three visits into the crowd while bassist Louis Jucker also jumps off the stage at one point, wielding his bass like a deadly weapon. How Robin Staps and Jonathan Nido can play their guitar parts whilst flinging themselves and their instruments around at such manic velocity is beyond comprehension. A gloriously intense display sees The Ocean’s set disappear in an all too short hour.
Textures have the unenviable task of following up and closing the show. Whilst the sextet are technically brilliant and provide near flawless renditions of much of their finest material, the energy levels slide downwards as they arrive on stage. Opening with an instrumental track seems to as much confuse the audience as it does tantalise and it takes frontman Daniel de Jongh’s goading to get much action down the front at all. The hardcore fans in the venue are lapping things up but for the rest of the crowd things are, if not dull, just a little unexciting. The likes of “Consonant Hemispheres” and “Awake” stand out as obvious highlights though, and the set does become more enjoyable towards its conclusion and there is still no doubting that these Dutch riff-monsters are one of the best metal bands on the planet at the moment. This cannot change the fact however that Textures have been dealt a raw deal by having to play after The Ocean night after night, in the live arena energy can always beat even musicality as superb as this.
Textures’ excellent “Dualism” album is out now. An interview with the band will be published on Stereoboard shortly.
The Ocean’s “Heliocentric” and “Anthropocentric” albums are available now.
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Textures have the unenviable task of following up and closing the show. Whilst the sextet are technically brilliant and provide near flawless renditions of much of their finest material, the energy levels slide downwards as they arrive on stage. Opening with an instrumental track seems to as much confuse the audience as it does tantalise and it takes frontman Daniel de Jongh’s goading to get much action down the front at all. The hardcore fans in the venue are lapping things up but for the rest of the crowd things are, if not dull, just a little unexciting. The likes of “Consonant Hemispheres” and “Awake” stand out as obvious highlights though, and the set does become more enjoyable towards its conclusion and there is still no doubting that these Dutch riff-monsters are one of the best metal bands on the planet at the moment. This cannot change the fact however that Textures have been dealt a raw deal by having to play after The Ocean night after night, in the live arena energy can always beat even musicality as superb as this. 
