Is hardcore built to last? Back in the heyday of punk, the late ‘70s, and on through the early ‘90s, there was a distinct attitude that if you played heavy music, you weren’t going to make it long. Most bands burnt out or faded away after short bursts of activity, while legends regularly passed from the excesses of their lifestyle, and it seemed that you’d never see anyone over the age of forty going up and screaming or bashing a guitar on stage. Obviously, the case is different in 2018. Three decades in now, the legends of Neurosis and Converge continue unabated, and without having lost a single bit of their impact and raw viscosity, as they showed in Austin, Texas, with a wild Saturday night tour closing show at Emo’s on July 21.
The night kicked off with the young Birds in Row, relative newcomers from France who come packing a throwback screamo style of hardcore that has earned them mass critical acclaim. Birds in Row have far more in common with the earlier days of the genre, being indebted to bands like Orchid and Saetia more than anything that got labeled screamo in years since, but the addition of clean singing and softer, alternative emo sections on new record We Already Lost the World has taken their sound to a new level. While Birds in Row can bring it on the level of chaotic screaming and jagged guitar licks, it’s the cleanly picked, twinkling emo sections that brought the crowd to transcendence in their opening slot.
Similarly, Converge trotted out several new tricks in a stellar, forward looking set. Though technically a double headliner, it’s been a long time since anyone has seen a Converge set that did not end a show, but Converge made sure that everyone was good and sweaty and full of piss and vinegar before staring down the mighty Neurosis. Playing a setlist tailored from latest release The Dusk in Us, Converge proved every bit as havoc-inducing and vital as they’ve always been. Lose a step? Never. The band ripped through newer tracks like “I Can Tell You About Pain” and “Eye of the Quarrel,” with every bit of the same hardcore, driving energy that carried earlier inclusions like You Fail Me’s “Drop Out” and “Heartless” or Jane Doe’s “Concubine,” which closed the set. However, it was the middle section, the long, brooding title track from The Dusk in Us, which truly stunned. Converge has rarely been a band to let up for even a moment live, but allowing the audience and the song to breathe a bit made for one of the most epic moments of Converge lore, matching up to the high standard set by previous Converge slow burners like the masterful classic “Jane Doe.”
The art of the slow burn is one conquered, packaged, consumed, and traded in nightly by closing band Neurosis. Inspiring cult-like, slavish devotion from fans, Neurosis have been pounding away at this sound for so long that one would also wonder if they could continue to excite. Through a primal, punishing set, Neurosis weaved their way through winding passages of metal triumph and ambient soul-searching. Though the focus landed squarely on 2016’s Fires Within Fires, their most recent release, Neurosis truly achieved metal god-status with 1996’s Through Silver in Blood, and true to form, through all the wandering, soul-searching gloom and doom of their newer music, it all came back to the title track of that classic record, closing out the set with all the purity of their sonic destruction.
Birds in Row are practically children compared to Neurosis and Converge at this point, but served as the perfect complementary point for the esteemed veterans. Their sound, and the rest of the exciting, young bands coming out today, may yet become legendary in their own right. However, through two and a half hours of stunning brutality, Converge and Neurosis laid down their case to hold onto the torch just a little longer. Unquestioningly, they each remain some of the most important and vital progenitors in the entirety of metal and hardcore.
