HEALTH, London Highbury Garage

HEALTH by Paul Caudell

October 27th 2009

LA noisemakers HEALTH are a band that must be observed in the flesh. This isn’t to say that their albums are in any way ineffectual, but live their music is given a whole new tumultuous and ear-shattering ferocity. HEALTH don’t hold back, primarily because their songs don’t allow it. Live, any deviation from pure abrasive fury would render their music largely impotent.

Tonight at the Garage, HEALTH’s first support are Pens, a trio of young London ladies who play lo-fi, garage pop-gems that have an air of Bikini Kill. Despite their fledgling appearance and stage demeanour, they play a collection of remarkably catchy songs, and probably deserve to be higher on a bill somewhere else. Denver’s Pictureplane follows them, and is an amalgamation of acid, funky house with singing. Think Har Mar Superstar being serious. It’s often quite tawdry, but provides a reasonably cheap dance beat between the bands.

After some time fiddling with amps, knobs and machine heads, HEALTH begin with roaring aplomb. Immediately arresting with dazzling noise, nearly ripping the strings from their guitars, you get the impression it’s gonna be a loud night.

It is. HEALTH are perfectly executing their finely tuned chaos. For a short moment a mosh pit has formed, although the awkward time changes don’t permit its existence for long, leaving a small group of combative indie fops redundantly looking round with fists clenched. ‘We Are Water’ is superb, and brief shards of stunning sound are replicated to perfection. HEALTH are all about the noise. There’s tremendous snippets of sound, such as the distorted, shimmering steel drum that permeates ‘Heaven’ and much of their set. The stammering intro of ‘Die Slow’ coupled with the primal drumming sets the audience to a uniformed bop. While tonight it’s slightly faster than usual, it’s obviously the favourite of the masses.

For ‘Before Tigers’, the drums are again relentless, guitar’s a shrill yet tender synth, and behind the congested and cacophonous melee of noises, the vocals are high above in the blissful and vulnerable echelons. The heavier numbers find the band flailing around, violently thrashing guitars that are seemingly held together by electrical tape, and pounding the drums to within an inch of their capability. Bassist John sways centre crazy like some half-assed lunatic aerobics teacher, turned unhinged on speed laced slimming pills, he screams almighty and ear piercing for the brief ‘Courtship’.

Sure, the set could have been longer, and the volume maybe a little more thunderous. However, with Get Colour totalling a delightfully fleeting duration of just over half an hour, my ears were thankful for the compact set. One of the great things about HEALTH tonight is that they’ve not outstayed their welcome. There’s no fluff, it’s a short, sharp burst of lethargic, ear numbing goodness.