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Wolfmother December 2, 2006 |
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Written by K. Patrick Welch
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Tuesday, 12 December 2006 |
 Photo credit Brad Hodge
Roseland Ballroom, Portland, OR
December 2, 2006
With a sensibility towards the riff, not the hit, Wolfmother surfed an impossible wave of expectation, staying upright throughout and never dropping the seemingly insurmountable enthusiasm created long before the chants of “Wolf-Moth-Er” ushered the band onstage. The expectation was high when Wolfmother kicked off a 14-song set of guitar-crunching, ear-splitting music that turned even the balcony into a mosh pit. Performing moves last seen at a Deep Purple concert, the band presented an evening that never felt planned; it always felt like lead guitarist/singer Andrew Stockdale was simply in the moment.
Stockdale’s disciplined adherence to keeping the space left by a riff
uncluttered by guitar work made each song anticipatory from moment to
moment rather than an obnoxious evening of noise. Make no mistake,
Wolfmother is loud, but the sound is structured, the loud is an
attitude. So many moments gave the impression that Wolfmother is more
than a sonic return to hard rock’s classic roots: the microphone slung
in the air like a lasso, the on-the-knees Jimi-esque guitar playing and
the Chuck Berry/Angus Young duck walk. At one point, lighters lit up
the ballroom—a scene seemingly extinct since the proliferation of cell
phones.
With Chris Ross wrestling his keyboard to the ground and playing upside down alongside the little hula girl shaking like a wet dog on Myles Heskett’s
kick drum and Stockdale’s less than original, but absolutely called for
and perfectly performed moves, the 90-minute evening ended all too soon.
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Last Updated ( Tuesday, 22 May 2007 )
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