Mastodon Live Up To Their Dynamic Openers

Mastodon. are quickly becoming one of the biggest names in heavy metal, and their well-balanced mix of crushing riffs and progressive experimentation makes them appeal to a huge variety of heavy music fans. That said, it's probably a bad idea to get two of the most energetic bands in hardcore to open for you if you're a tech-metal band who put instrumental ingenuity over onstage intensity.

Los Angeles punk rockers The Bronx opened the proceedings to little fanfare, but once frontman Matt Caughthran jumped into the crowd to mosh along to their anthem, "They Will Kill Us All (Without Mercy)," everyone was rushing to get a piece of him. The man's perpetual goofy grin and cocksure swagger makes him a great frontman, and any attendees who didn't like the band at first were easily won over by the end of their set.

Their newer material, which is far less ballsy than the work on their debut album, sounded much better live. The Bronx brought a second guitarist to flesh out their sound, and songs like "Rape Zombie" sounded much stronger aided by the Phoenix's sound system. Even their hilariously out of place David Lee Roth-aping track, "White Guilt," seemed perfectly in line with the rest of their set. Though this was my fourth time seeing them (and third this year alone), The Bronx always leave me wanting more.

It seemed strange that Converge weren't the ones headlining this show, given that 30 per cent of the audience was wearing their merch and chanting their name. The influential hardcore band stalked onstage to uproarious applause and, as soon as they ripped into Jane Doe's bombastic opening duo, "Concubine" and "Fault And Fracture," the crowd went — for lack of a better term — batshit fucking loco.

I'll never really understand "hardcore dancing," as it's just a more sophisticated (and I use that term loosely) form of moshing, but in the end it's like comparing Cro-magnons to Neanderthals. Despite how ridiculous it is, half the floor of the venue erupted into a massive circle pit with everyone inside throwing spin-kicks and windmills, or whatever moves the kids are coming up with these days.

The Boston quartet mostly stuck to material off 2004's You Fail Me, but also played a couple of new tracks off their upcoming album, No Heroes. (As a side note about the new material: I didn't think it was possible, but the band seem to have gotten even heavier.) Frontman Jake Bannon stalked the stage and didn't stand in one spot for more than five seconds during their set, unleashing his inhuman shriek while flailing around like a man possessed.

The reason the band have come to be so exalted was made clear by Kurt Ballou's serrated riffs, Ben Koller's machine-gun drumming and Nate Newton's rumbling low end. As chaotic as their music is, it's incredible that the songs sounded even more cohesive live than they do on record. After closing with "The Broken Vow," the band walked off the stage, taking the aforementioned 30 per cent of the crowd with them.

Mastodon had two tough acts to follow, but they had their headlining status working in their favour. The entire crowd was chanting "Mas-to-don!" in anticipation of their arrival. Walking on stage amidst a swirl of sound effects and a simple, Tolkien-esque backdrop, the band ripped into the stomping march of Leviathan's "Iron Tusk."

It's understandable, given the precision required to pull off their sound, that Mastodon are not the most kinetic onstage personalities. But their music, especially their latest LP, Blood Mountain, isn't really about that. The band embrace musical proficiency over raw energy. With that in mind, they sounded fantastic. Though mindless noodling and guitar wankery would fit perfectly with their style of music, the band kept things concise, allowing their songs to speak for themselves. Instead of falling flat after two superb openers, the band succeeded on their own terms, completing one of the best heavy music bills of the year.