The STRHESS Tour Bleeding Through, ZAO, Darkest Hour, Misery Signals and Fight Paris
By Dan Hoyt
Portland was rocked hard on July 21st with one of the biggest hardcore tours to hit the tiny Loveland Theater in a long time, the STRHESS Tour, headlined by Bleeding Through. The show was a wave on nonstop frenetic energy that kept the crowd rocking, rolling and doing some ridiculous dancing until the very end.
Fight Paris kicked off the show before half of the audience had even shown up yet, but they hit hard by ripping off several head-banging tunes in a short set (around 20-25 minutes). Very enjoyable performance though, leaning more towards a straight-up hard rock sound rather than hardcore. The crowd seemed a bit anxious though, like they weren’t quite ready to go crazy yet but wanted to really damn bad.
They got their chance when Misery Signals came on. All of a sudden the Loveland got very dark and the band hit with a fury, and it was like something in the crowd snapped. A huge pack of kids surged to the front with a hardcore dancing pit forming behind them and the pushing and shoving started. The lead singer ate it up, getting right into the kids faces while screaming and holding the microphone out to them as well. The set was dark and brutal and was very well-received. The pit got a little out of control nearing the end of the set, however, and a fight broke out amongst a few dancers who weren’t watching where they were swinging their fists and feet. It didn’t interrupt the set, however, and was broken up shortly. Overall, Misery Signals set was crazy, loud and really turned up the heat and adrenaline in the theater.
Speaking of heat, it was sweltering in the Loveland, like a steam bath that hit hard especially after Misery Signals left. Kids swarmed up the stairs to the balcony but even that wasn’t really enough with the humidity outside causing a lot of discomfort as well. AC must’ve been broken or something.
The heat was suddenly forgotten when Darkest Hour came on. Tearing right into the title track off of their new album Undoing Ruin, “With a Thousand Words to Say but One,” the band went ballistic on stage and sent the crowd into an equal frenzy. The kids up front pretty much abandoned all common sense and started climbing on stage, sometimes doing belly flops and flips back into the crowd or trying to grab lead singer John Henry (who was already flailing around enough) and sing along with him. Henry didn’t seem to mind though, and the band was absolutely fantastic, playing a lot of old hits as well as busting out some heavy thrashing new songs. Guitarist Mike Schleibaum at one point did a machine gun motion with his guitar and really got the crowd riled up every time he did it. Henry was a little annoyed with the spaz dancing going on in the pit, however, and preferred (in his best growling voice) that the kids form a “CIRCLE PITTTTTTTT,” complete with rotating hand motion. I don’t they really paid attention, but they gave the band a great reaction anyway. By far the most appreciated opening act of the night.
ZAO came on next with no banner or introduction, just a straight-up audio blasting to surprise the crowd and kick everything off. Lead singer Dan Weyandt got down on his knees quite often during the show to bellow own his lyrics and the crowd joined in with his yells. More kids kept climbing up on stage to try and touch him and then jump off. The band sounded fine and pounded the audience with an ear-shattering loud set that thumped and thundered the whole theater like crazy. I chatted with Weyandt earlier in the week and he said band was often cursed with a string of bad luck, however, and that seemed to kick in near the end of the set when a wild stage diver kicked guitarist Russ Cogdell’s guitar and appeared to break a few strings. Cogdell was able to borrow another guitar though and the band was up and rocking again after a short five-minute break. The heat seemed to hit Weyandt the hardest though as he was practically sweating a downpour as he jumped off the stage. It was that hot in there. I liked the performance though; they busted out several old songs, calling them a tribute to old-school grindcore, and didn’t let up despite technical difficulties and a very rowdy crowd.
After what seemed like an eternity of setting up, the lights went black once again and with a roaring scream of “THERE WAS A FIREFIIIIIIGHT,” Bleeding Through came flying onto stage and lead singer Brandan Schieppati starting jumping around stage, pumping the amazingly not-exhausted crowd up to the max. Kicking right into a couple hits off of their 2003 album “This is Love, This is Murderous,” the band fired up the thrashing beats once more and tore through a great set. Crowd stagedivers were getting on stage in droves now, at least 10 or 11 per song. Brandan caught one of them just as he ended a song, however, and made the guy do a flip dive into the crowd after lecturing him on how he broke the first rule of stagediving. Pretty funny. Brandan’s jumping and thrusting his mic into the crowd brought tons of adrenaline to the front, while in the back, Marta the keyboardist headbanged like crazy while singing pretty much every single one of Brandan’s lyrics as loud as she could. That was interesting to see. Near the end, Brandan stopped the show and lectured the crowd one more time, pacing frantically as he told them to listen to what they wanted without fear of being picked on and so on. The crowd gave him a big hand and without further adieu, the band finished the set with Brandan’s favorite BT song (or so he told me), “On Wings of Lead.” Fun show and really great to watch.
Overall the STRHESS Tour was everything I thought it would be and much, much more. The Portland crowd certainly proved their craziness by getting as rowdy as possible (while managing to avoid injuries, which really surprised me) and never running out of energy in the sauna-like heat until the very end. Fantastic show and I was very pleased coming out the door.
