Concert Review: Meshuggah w/ Converge & Torche - September 29th, 2022

#Meshuggah #Converge #Torche #Tour #vimh

Starting off...

Chicago traffic sucks, horribly, especially late afternoon.

Due to some horrible traffic on the way into Radius, which is down on Cermak Rd. in Chicago near Chinatown, we missed the first half of Torche's set. What we did hear of Torche, was great, I loved it. Doomy, and boomy. Radius is a large space, and the booming of Torche's down-tuned guitars filled every available inch of that cavernous space. I really wish that I had been able to catch Torche's entire set. Hopefully next time they roll around, I will be able to catch their entire show.

With a short 20 minute break for the stage crew to swap out instruments and amps. Converge was the next outfit to come on stage.

In all honestly, I had heard of Converge, but never checked them out properly. Hardcore has never really been on my radar on a regular basis. Then I found out that Converge has been a band since 1990, with the vocalist and guitarist being founding members. For those guys to be going out and going as hard as they do, for as long as they have been, every night, is no small feat. I immensely enjoyed the music they put out. For me though, on a personal level I wasn't a huge fan of the vocals. They fit great for the music though, and plenty of people had a great time in the crowd. Crazy amounts of energy up on stage.

Then we got a bit of little break before things got all....what's the word....meshuggah.

We were treated to nice playlist of various songs in 8-bit format as a nice little aural palette cleanser. The most interesting song being an 8-bit version of 'Walk'.

Before Meshuggah actually takes the stage, we are treated to the original version of 'Careless Whisper'.

Then the lights go out and things start to get tense. Low rumbles begin to fill the space and in the dark you see the metal masters walk onto the stage in front of banners of cover art from their new album 'Immutable'. The banners are hiding several massive stacks of lights that are used in their incredible light show.

The first song they rip into is 'Broken Cog' off of the new album. As the tight chugging guitars and drums chug in time, the banners light up behind the band and show their dark silhouettes. Jens vocals were fully on par for how you expect him to sound.

Meshuggah's light show is famous all over the world of music. Even if people haven't listened to Meshuggah, they have probably heard about their lightshow. It's run manually every night by their lighting director. I will go on record saying that no band can surpass the show Meshuggah puts on with their lights.

Along with 'Broken Cog', we were also treated with one of their biggest, and most popular songs, 'Rational Gaze', 'Born In Dissonance', 'In Death – Is Death', and there was a surprise in the night too that I won't spoil that they played as an encore. The setlist encompassed tracks from 7 of their 9 studio albums. Very well rounded setlist. It was an hour and a half setlist. That's a lot of Meshuggah. If you have listened to them in the past, you know that they aren't for beginner metalheads. Meshuggah is what I would call 'advanced listening'. You need to have some time, and listening to metal for a little while to be able to appreciate all that is going on. All of the polyrhythms, polymeters, intricate guitar and drum lines can be a lot to sift through in your mind while listening.