Katatonia, Cult of Luna, Tesseract and Intronaut @ The TLA.
Text by Chad Sims. Images by Ian Watson.
As laser lights and smoke filled the TLA Wednesday night, Intronaut grooved out their spacey set of progressive metal.
Intronaut is not what most people think of when they hear “heavy metal.” Their sound is more influenced by jazz than it is by head banging. Bassist Joe Lester played some of the smoothest bass lines around. Drummer Danny Walker pounded out complex patterns and guitarists/vocalists Sacha Dunable and Dave Timnick provided shimmering atmospherics and mostly clean vocals.
Despite their influences and sound, Intronaut are still a very challenging band and I mean that in the best way possible. They generate heaviness through depth and intricacy rather than volume and distortion.
This band is talented enough to be headlining their own tours (they have) but on Wednesday they were an opening act.
With barely enough time to hit the merch table and grab a beer, Cult of Luna hit the stage.
Room-rattling bass filled the venue and everyone in attendance new they were in for something different.
As the first song kicked in, the seven members of the band would appear and disappear amidst the light, shadow and smoke from on stage. It was often difficult to tell who was playing what but this seemed to be the intent and added to the off-putting nature of Cult of Luna’s music.
While this show was always intense, the band seemed to know it is best to hold something back for particular moments. At times, dubstep bass would fill the lower octave of the song or lighting effects that challenged Meshuggah’s over the top show (that review started with a warning for the epileptic). Unlike that show, Cult of Luna used these sorts of tricks as a crescendo of heaviness instead of an attempt to induce post-traumatic stress in the audience.
When I spoke with guitarist Johannes Persson the other day, he said that they were “in music to make experiences.” And as their fan Kevin Perry said of Wednesday’s show, “less of a show and more of an experience.”
Rounding out the night were melodic metal masters Katatonia.
Katatonia came through last year with the Devin Townsend Project, supporting their album Dead End Kings. Their new album Dethroned and Uncrowned suggests a continuation of the last album. In many ways, the new material sounds much like last year’s effort except expanded and enhanced, bigger and more epic.
As always, Katatonia didn’t disappoint and played an incredible set to cap a wonderful night of bands who are pushing the boundaries of what we consider metal.
JUMP: The Philly Music Project 
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