On a cold night down the seafront that could be accurately described as ‘Bitter And Then Some’, Converge brought the last show of their UK tour to Concorde2. Upon taking the stage vocalist Jake Bannon posed the questions “Are you ready? Are you sure?”. Nobody was.
Before any of this, though, was support act Touché Amoré. The Los Angeles post-hardcore group have built a huge following in recent years and have played three previous Brighton shows, all in a sweaty and packed-to-the-rafters Hydrant before its unfortunate demise. Despite there being a vast amount of people here tonight, there’s still a feeling that this is a band which suits smaller venues with no crowd barrier, allowing for stage-diving and some proper screamo carnage.
This doesn’t stop anybody from having fun though as we witness huge pile-ons at the front. People scramble forwards for the mic to join in with the vocalist during songs such as ‘Home Away From Here’ and ‘Honest Sleep’, and it feels as if we have been blown away enough already tonight.
Listening to Converge records you can hear how their style has changed over the years in favour of big heavy riffs and vocals that are more ‘shouty’ than they are ‘screamy’ – although we’re sure that to a lot of people that’ll make no sense and we’d be met with a response along the lines of “It’s all just noise” or “How are you meant to understand what he’s saying?”.
However, the Converge live engine is a wholly different experience altogether. What we get is a full-on assault on the senses as they dip into the speedy hardcore sound of 2003 album ‘Jane Doe’ followed up with tracks from the heavy as hell ‘Axe To Fall’, released in 2009. But the new release ‘All We Love We Leave Behind’ is the reason they are here tonight, and the reason why a packed out Concorde’s worth of minions have come to join the party.
Converge thrash out a kind of half-metal half-hardcore that shifts between fast and violent to just downright heavy, but it’d be one hell of an insult to call them ‘metalcore’. They are more like genre-defying legends of almost every heavy rock based scene. Whether you are a fan of hardcore, emo, metal, punk or grind, Converge have a little something in their music for you and a fanbase that consists of a whole mix of people that might usually closer associate themselves with any of the ‘subcultures’ aforementioned.
Reviewing this was difficult because it was hard to find somewhere to stand where you weren’t dragged into the pit, but could still appreciate their set and write half-drunken notes in your phone without it getting knocked out of your hand. The pit was hyperactive and vicious as Bannon flew around the stage like an excited child belting out songs including ‘The Broken Vow’, ‘Aimless Arrow’ and ‘Concubine’, often throwing the mic out into the crowd for someone else to have a go whilst the others stood at their posts firing out hardcore style backing vocals.
Converge may have won and lost fans over the years but one thing is sure, the power and aggression of their music is still very much alive. We are left with ringing in our ears and a sense that we may have just witnessed one of the craziest gigs of the year.
Concorde2, Saturday 1st December 2012
Words by Chris Biggs
Photos by Charles Shepherd
