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Die! Die! Die! Live Recordings + Bootleg (The Earl - Atlanta 3/24/08)
adam posted this concert, session onMarch 25th, 2008
On March 14 with little warning a tornado struck Atlanta, cutting a 6-mile path of destruction through the city, my city. I’ve had a few days to think about the storm, and I think the reason it was so upsetting was that I had always believed tall skyscrapers disrupted wind in a way that would make tornadoes impossible. I felt safe. Then the sky moved and tore down the neighborhood next to mine.
Last night I went to East Atlanta a neighborhood that lost power during the storm and suffered heavy damage from downed trees. I went to a wind battered Earl as a way to insert some fantasy in my week. The opening acts played their sets, and three innocuous guys in sweaters and spectacles started dragging their equipment to the front of the stage.
I went to grab a drink. When I returned, I saw the band had stripped to t-shirts and managed to look pretty tough. Of course, I was still under the impression that this particular band, Die! Die! Die!, that had traveled all the way from New Zealand to play 10 shows in 3 days at SXSW and then driven all the way to Atlanta, were merely trying to look tough. I was so accustom to the idea that musicians try to seem like something they are not, I didn’t realize or see the true and very real passion, anger, and commitment in front of me.
The first tree-cracking blast of the bass jolted me as Andrew Wilson flung his body off the stage into the slim Monday crowd. Hipsters scattered to avoid the unpredictable singer who occasionally clipped an audience member with an elbow while falling to writhe on the ground. He was so enraptured in pushing out the words of the song that they came in convulsions and shutters.
While Michael Prain was chained to his kit, Lachlan Anderson brought his bass out to bump his favorite girls. After the bass’ neck came dangerously close to grazing a good piece of my face, I realized something. This was not safe! Die! Die! Die! was not pretending. They weren’t pretending to make music that cut a 6-mile path of destruction. They were just doing it while each well placed note was making their bodies seize involuntarily. I was mysteriously thrilled, maybe a little calm. Life isn’t safe! It never will be, and pretending that it’s anything else is idiotic and dangerous. A lot more dangerous than getting knocked in the head by a bass guitar.
Every song was an attack. Every note was a solid point. Finally, after the last note came from Andrew and he quietly put down his Jaguar that had its strap duck taped on both ends, the 40 or so people at the Earl that night cheered. We clapped because we saw something worth seeing. We cheered because it wasn’t hipsters jerking themselves off. We roared because we genuinely wanted the band back on stage but knew they weren’t coming out.
Ultimately the band is something of a force of faith. You either know the pain they’re channeling and redirecting or not, but from this new fans perspective all those people out their who “just don’t get it” can fucking Die! Die! Die!
The Entire Show Courtesy of The Earl
Very nice! Great job of putting into words what a show by these New Zealand crazy persons is like. Thanks for the tracks as well!
Very nice, thanks for posting the show. We had a similar experience at SXSW in 2006, stumbling across them by accident only because we’d expended so much energy just barely getting to the place where Meneguar was playing, and we decided we were going to watch whoever came on next before hoofing it back t the main drag. It was Die! Die! Die! and while they aural voracity was apparent, they were actually fairly subdued, for them. A few of my friends saw their next show a day or two later, and told me about how nuts they were. We didn’t see them again until last year in San Francisco, in the tiny upstairs room of The Hemlock. My camera was knocked from my hands within the first few songs. Completely insane show, one of the best I’ve ever seen, and of course there were only about 15 people there.
I refuse to miss them ever again, and with the strong tunes on the new album, I can’t imagine these guys will be a secret too much longer.
This is beautiful.
It was a great experience!
It was incredibly weird to have seen how they were during the performance after having spent a couple of hours before the show talking to the guys. Very much like the eerie calm before a tornado touches down, these guys were very quiet and unassuming but then when they hit the stage, and the floor, and the speakers, and the back area near the bar (as all of these locations were pretty much fair game as performance areas) it was like the winds kicked up and they spiraled around out of control.
You really summed up the entire night better than I could have hoped to! Excellent blogging on an excellent show!!
They will be back here in May (I think anyway) so I am bracing myself for another storm of a performance. When I go to that show I plan on assuming the “elementary school tornado drill position” so as to avoid being hit by flying objects!
Great to meet you guys as well! I look forward to talking more!
Carrie
this review is sooooo well-stated. i was totally caught off-guard by Die! Die! Die!…i knew they would be great, but wasn’t expecting to be AS rocked or inspired or affected as i was after seeing their set. they left me hungry for more, & i can’t wait till they come through Atlanta again…
Every show they play is like that.
We’re all looking forward to some more London shows…
x
exactly why I love them.
Very nice write-up for one of the best live bands in the world right now. Also, very grateful for the live recordings!
Im from New Zealand and have been exposed to Die! Die! Die! since I was about.. 13 and from then (after seeing them live the first time I broke my nose and got mild concussion but was fucking sweet) I have been a big fan. They’re amazing, New Zealand has an untouched punk scene which is world class. DEFINATLY check out a band called The Mint Chicks. http://www.myspace.com/themintchicks ; equally as amazing and put on an incredible show.
Die! Die! Die! at Camp A Low Hum on acid was amazing. Enough said.
the first picture for this post has imprinted itself in my mind and aligned itself with this site. looking at the rest of them, I’m assuming that the initials in the watermark mean these are photos a la occhipinti. amazing, they make me feel like I caught the show.