By Jase Walker
I’ve mentioned it a few times but the move to the Netherlands has afforded me the ability to catch some particularly unique shows over the past years, tonight is a good example of this. Between festival shows, the Netherlands has been blessed with a fairly unique co-headliner show of two bands that I just assumed I’d never see together, Igorrr and HEALTH. That being said, looking at it, they’re both their own unique brand of weirdness so I guess it’s not all that unexpected but I’m not going to worry too much about it because I fucking love ‘em.
Opening for tonight are Belgian electro punk noise makers, Doodseskader, who were probably my outright favourite band of the weekend at Jera On Air this year, so I’ve lucked out a bit tonight I think.
The venue’s looking pretty reasonably filled for Doodseskader to get things kicked off. Compared to the first time I saw them, the bass in this venue during their intro is punishing, each hit bounces through my chest and I can hear other people also commenting on how much they’re feeling it.
Doodseskader aren’t subtle about their rage at modern society, opening with ‘Glass Mask On’ and ‘Celebrity Culture Simp Farm’, and launching a salvo of resentment at the commodification of people’s attention. Shows like this always serve to be a strong reminder that it’s often hard to really judge a lot of bands on a festival show, even when I really enjoy them.
There’s something so very special about how elevated a band’s live show can be when the bar was already set so high even on a mid-day slot at a blisteringly hot festival. Not only that but they’ve gotten a solid 45 min slot to do their thing as well so excuse me while my cup runneth over.
HEALTH kicks their intro off with their usual choice of the intro to ‘Neon Genesis Evangelion’, most likely because of Jonny more than anything. Jonny has also committed to wearing his cat ears on stage now too. Also I’ve spotted someone extra on stage with them so I guess they’ve had to add someone to flesh the live sound out a bit now they’re hitting bigger stages.
For what it’s worth, HEALTH have massively stepped their game up here, the new production feels like this is what they’ve been aiming at for a long time now and they’ve not lost any intensity with growing into such a large stage. What’s also striking about the production is it feels as if HEALTH are leaning more heavily into the evil disco vibes, lots of lines of strobing lights along with powerful flood lights that are tightly matched to the rhythm of each song. This even extends to the venue’s overhead rigging as well, it’s brilliantly executed.
Considering the first time I got to see these a few years back was at The White Hotel in Manchester which, just for reference, was a dingy repurposed car garage with a bar attached, it’s astounding seeing them grow into this. Not to mention that they also sound bloody fantastic too, whoever’s doing sound for the show this evening is delivering the goods on some good strong low end and I can feel the hairs on my arms vibrating.
I do feel there sometimes is a bit of a trade-off between large and small shows when it comes to how much you can personalise things a bit and I feel it quite strongly for this show. HEALTH have always been quite a funny band to see due to the banter antics, mainly from Jonny throughout the show but there’s been a noticeable reduction in favour of keeping the crowd energy going.
The lighting design reminds me quite a lot of Perturbator with its use of synchronised beams of light moving in unison and giving the stage a look as if it’s rocking around in water. Quite chuffed for a headliner set out of nowhere for HEALTH, just need to make sure I don’t miss the other two chances I have this year to see them!
Prior to Igorrr, I shouldn’t be surprised that the interval music is a large selection of super intense classical piano numbers, but it still catches me out. As ever their stage production looks cool as hell, three large drapes of cloth, one adorned by their signature ‘I’ in the middle as well as a central platform that lights up with handprints showing when highlighted.
This band’s knack for switching gears suddenly throughout each of their songs is totally unmatched, black metal one moment, glitchy breakcore the next. Both of their singers draw the focus in and project all manner of noise whether it’s disgusting gutturals or operatic vocals that seemingly have no upper limit on their pitch. This will also be the only band you’ll ever see get a circle pit going to literal baroque music, obviously mixed in with other elements but still firmly baroque. From my rather lovely raised vantage point I’ve got a fantastic view of the front-centre of the crowd and the pit that kicked off right from the start of the show is growing steadily as the show wears on.
Of course, there’s also segments where Igorrr (the actual bands founder himself) takes a moment to remind the crowd that he is still very much a breakcore artist as he beats the crowd around the head with the aptly named ‘ADHD’. I’m quite happy that even now ‘ieuD’ still seems to be an irreplaceable part of their set, the song that properly drew me in and is still in my opinion the best song to show all of Igorrr’s facets out in one song.
It’s also standing out to me more now than it has done before but the almost revolving door of every member barring Igorrr himself moving on and off the stage like a choreographed theatre show. Each time I see Igorrr I always seem to notice some new detail about their live show and beyond the general exterior of weirdness and chaotic music is a bunch of performers that are incredibly committed to the stage show every bit as much as the music.
What a joy it is to see Igorrr playing such large stages these days though, gone are the days where they were a recommendation from that oddball bloke you met one night at 4am at a music festival and instead very much in the wider palette of bands doing unusual things in brilliant ways to thousands of people.
Truly a unique smattering of ridiculous fun, never boring.
- The tour finishes at ArcTanGent in Bristol next Thursday (20 August).
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