Dodsferd at The Black Castle

Needless to say, a kvlt act such as Dodsferd will rarely play live, if at all. Not only that, last night's show in Los Angeles represented Dodsferd's first live appearance in North America, and who the Hell only knows when they'll appear here again. Naturally, I had to make my way to The Black Castle, L.A.'s VERY underground extreme metal venue, in order to take it all in, courtesy of Mort Noire and Hatewar Productions.

As expected (and, as is always the case at The Black Castle), there were a slew of openers, mostly various black metal bands from up and down California. Most of the bands more or less sounded the same; that is, low-fi, droning black metal with lots of speed, atmosphere, and screeches. However, there were a few elements that set each band apart from the others, though.

Black Mist, up first, were the most atmospheric and droning of the evening's cadre of bands, complete with candles, fire breathing (see clip below), and drumming that consisted entirely of simple patterns, rolls, and fills. Aeternum were definitely the best of the bunch, mostly due to some pretty good songwriting that had just the right blend of catchiness and kvlt aesthetics. Nekcrium were similar with a certain bouncy, almost upbeat feel to their music, but just didn't have the catchiness that Aeternum had in spades. Gravespawn were the most baroque with bombastic stage presence, but drastically overstayed their welcome by at least five songs, not even finishing up until nearly 1 AM (yikes!)

In the middle of all this were Killgasm, a different band that has virtually defined its own genre, one that I can only describe as "blackened hatecore." Fascinated by serial killers and other forms of mass murder, Killgasm are a horrid mess that, frankly, are not exactly good on record, but blow the top off in a live setting. A quick set that got the by now packed house moving, Killgasm's drummer threw in tongue in cheek humor with... ahem.... VERY politically incorrect diatribes along with exhortations to the crowd to tear apart a bible that he thoughtfully tossed into the pit. He did, however, ask the crowd to refrain from burning the bible as that would constitute a violation of fire codes.

Dodsferd finally took the stage and pretty much blew everyone away with a high energy set. A pronounced presence, garish corpsepaint, incredible speed, and dynamic shrieking from Wrath left everyone in the audience in tatters, finally closing out the show after 2 AM...

Black Mist



Aeternum



Killgasm



Nekcrium




Gravespawn



Dodsferd











Imminent...