Beyond the awards and the accolades Baroness has managed to reach a status that few bands in music ever will, they have transcended genres. Ask any Baroness fan what kind of music do they play, and you’re likely to get a blank stare before some “hmmming” and “hawing” before the bail out answer “metal?”
Metal, is not an incorrect answer by any means with their albums finding their way on to countless best of list and reader polls including their second full length release the “Blue” album being named the 20th greatest metal album of all time by LA Weekly. Think about that for a second, the 20th greatest metal album of all time! that means there are only 19 greater metal albums in the history of the genre.
Baroness have found a way to meld their music into this ever moving hard to pin down sound, from the chunkiest of riffs to the spaciest of intros and break downs, part Pink Floyd with the technical prowess of Rush all the while being fueled with the energy and grit of late 80’s hardcore. Doom, Prog, Sludge, Post Rock, Psychedelia, Baroness takes a little of each and sounds like none of the above, crafting heavy duty works of music that the whole crowd can still manage to sing along to.
As the opening notes of Kerosene trickled out of the amps John Baizley prowled around the stage with telecaster in hand, showing his teeth in a snarl of excitement not unlike a tiger waiting for his dinner while trapped in a cage. Baizley would continue between each and every song half smile, half snarl, feeding off the crowds energy as the crowd definitely fed off his. Pacing within the small space between guitarist Peter Adams and bass player Nick Jost the three including drummer Sebastian Thomson (formerly of Trans Am) launched into a set consisting mostly of material from “Green and Yellow” and the most recently released “Purple” album.
The set was wonderfully dished out with ebb and flow between the downright heavy and some of the more carefully crafted almost ambient instrumentations the band has become known for. The encore gave the crowd a fan favorite, “Isaac” from the “Red” album as well as “Take My Bones Away” a massive anthem from “Green and Yellow.”
Baroness live is always one of the more impressive displays of music that can be witnessed. A storm of hair, sweat and endless riffage, the joy the band is experiencing while playing translates directly with the crowd in way that is far too rare these days. After the horrible bus crash the band suffered while touring through Europe in August of 2012, leaving the band broken physically and figuratively, it’s clear that Baizley and Adams along with the help of their new mates Jost and Thomson no longer take nights like these for granted.
