Dillinger Escape Plan @Capitol, Perth (16/5/10)

Thu 20th May, 2010 in Gig Reviews

A Dillinger night is like buying a pill in Perth- you never know what to expect. But unlike the pressed pieces of chalk’n’shit that circulate around our laneways, a Dillinger Escape Plan show always delivers a good time.

All hail he or she who finds the perfect back up for the chaotic five piece; it seems no support band can ever cater for the wide variety (a whole Capitol full) of fans Dillinger pull. Eleventh He Reaches London did a decent job on their Ire Works tour, a much better one than the two bands they had with them for their Option Paralysis tour on Sunday.

Periphery was first up, all the way from Maryland in the US. Unfortunately they didn’t do much to impress a room of picky Dillinger Escape Plan fans. They had a little bit of Fear Factory about them and some tweeky little amphetamine riffs which were cool.

Vocalist Spencer Sotelo could really wail on occasion but other times he totally missed the key. This was hard to figure out, as was his singing about acid rain at one point. Hexus from Fern Gully (yes the animated children’s movie that Avatar ripped off) sang a song about acid rain; say no more.

Matt Halpern, behind the drums, was a concrete metal skinsman and lifted the standard of his band as he pummeled away. Periphery were all right at times but there were many local acts (see Tangled Thoughts of Leaving) that would have done more to prep people’s brains for a Dillinger scramble.

Maylene and the Sons of Disaster weren’t much better suited as a support but felt a more established act than their predecessor. On an Avenged Sevenfold tour they would have gone down a treat, but not so much on this one. The band looked as though they had chosen to drink rather than sleep on their flight over which culminated in a massive heave from guitarist Jake Duncan. “I swear that is the first time I’ve ever spewed on stage,” he said in his defence.

Frontman Dallas Taylor (ex-Underoath) appeared the most scattered of the bunch and ebbed and flowed between disinterest (drunk Jim Morrison) and southern fried recklessness (Bon Scott). It was a set of gritty bar-fight music that just wasn’t sitting right in the context of the night. In fact it wasn’t sitting it was standing and threatening the audience with a bar stool. This volatility was appreciated but it was not something a crowd who had “just come to see Dillinger” could really be bothered with.

The moment has arrived and it’s exhausting watching The Dillinger Escape Plan. They aren’t letting the fact they haven’t slept for forty hours (according to Puciato) get in the way of pushing themselves to the absolute limit of what everyone has come to expect from them. This stage show should not be viewed by anyone with epilepsy.

Punters’ eyes are darting every which way from the moment Puciato cannons himself into the crowd as Panasonic Youth kicks in to open the show. There are a few more people to catch him this year than there were in 2008.

The band appears to enjoy playing Capitol, using the plentiful space to climb and scatter about like they’ve just been freed from a padded cell.

Weinman stays off the bar this year but spends much of the show pirouetting off the drum stage whilst scratching at his ADD riffs. His guitar’s headstock becomes a vicious weapon as he thrashes like a mad man in a strait jacket. Fellow axeman Jeff Tuttle spends his time between crowd and stage and somehow both he and his riffs always arise unscathed.

The band have recently gone through drummers like Spinal Tap and their latest Billy Rymer looks like a (beat) keeper as he traces a perfect forgery of the band’s erratic signatures.

Their setlist, like their music, encompasses bits and pieces from all over the place, perfectly arranged and executed to fuck with whoever’s listening. They allow Milk Lizard to straighten everyone out then induce schizophrenia with Sugar Coated Sour. Chinese Whispers reveals how mental their new music is live and When Good Dogs do Bad Things follows it up with a disorienting warp back to 2002.

Black Bubblegum arouses some out of tune falsetto from the crowd. 43% Burnt has the mosh wondering what the fuck they are meant to be doing.

But Farewell Mona Lisa, oh lord, Farewell Mona Lisa is a punishing final score. It builds and builds, then breaks, then builds again, the crowd help Puciato hit the high vocals. The room knows what’s coming and falls silent except for Rymer and Wilson who work the song into its frenetic climax. The Capitol explodes.

THAT WE WOULD NEVER LEAVE THAT WE WOULD NEVER LEAVE THAT WE WOULD NEVER LEAVE THAT WE WOULD NEVER LEAVE

An encore isn’t necessary.