The Mars Volta - Live in West Hollywood, California

Review:

“The word on the street is that this is THE band to see.

Both Courtney Love and Winona Ryder showed up tonight just to see them.

I had a little bit of a heads up on this band before the show.

Last night, I was AIMing with my friend Sioux who’s an intern with Vagrant Records. She was at the House of Blues show on Friday night. I think she put it this way…

Mars Volta = WOW

This morning, I was chatting with epinions’s resident authority on punk (Pezking) who filled me in on more detail. He told me that At the Drive-In is taking a breather and they’ve split into 2 bands: De Facto and Mars Volta.

Armed with these 2 informed advisers at my back, I went into the show with a heightened expectation.

I still wan’t prepared for what I saw. Without exaggerating, this was probably the most incredible thing I’ve ever seen in concert.

They started performing, and the assault didn’t stop for 30 minutes. Cedric’s stage presence is incredible. He invokes so much sexuality into the music he produces… It felt like ejaculate as sound.

While talking with sioux* again tonight after the show, this little dialog transpired:

ociferdown: Mars Volta was the most incredible thing
ociferdown: the kids had no idea what to do with it
ociferdown: people were just in shock
ociferdown: afraid to dance… just staring with their jaws on the floor
—–sioux: haha
—–sioux: cedric dances like iggy pop
—–sioux: great guy

Personally, I thought he came off more like Jim Morrison than Iggy Pop, but you get the idea. We were definitely in the presence of a genius.

Cedric would move and gyrate his body with the sound… he actually appeared to be climaxing at various moments in the show. It was very orgasmic and sexual. He also used his microphone cord… wrapping his face, neck and arms and swinging the mic in circles while singing. At one point, he threw it in the air and missed his catch! The microphone hit the stage with a BANG and, rather than miss his timing, he dove to the ground and continued singing from the floor.

He repeatedly bit the cymbols while the drummer banged away. He’d release his bite seconds before the drummer slammed the cymbol! I thought he was going to get his teeth smashed right out of his skull at any moment. It was pretty incredible!

At one point, some idiot in the back made a stupid comment. Cedric replied with “I’m gonna put you into an emo-concentration camp for carrying around kleenex boxes! That’ll give you white kids something to cry about!“

One of the things that impressed me about this act, was the fact that they don’t have an album out yet, so no one knew what to expect. The crowd was completely unprepared for anything quite so… alive. This was pure rock and roll. Violent… Sexy… unforgiving. Piss and vinegar, salt-in-the-wound rock and roll. And it was way over the heads of 95% of the people in the room.

I have no idea if the album will be able to convey the vitriolic and perverse energy of this live show, but if it comes half as close, I’m buying it.

And you will too, mark my words.”