Resolution for 2015: more metal.
Crushing riffs, loudly played, have a cleansing effect. Headbanging offers a good upper-body workout and keeps the chiropractic community in the black (a metal color). And metal crowds will accept you for who you are; announce loudly it’s your first metal show and see what happens.
There’s no better metal-initiation ritual this month than High on Fire’s show at the Webster Underground in Hartford on Saturday, Jan. 10. With lyrics inspired by conspiracy theories, Pharisees, warriors, Yetis, samurai and other deeply metal subjects, the Oakland trio — guitarist/singer Matt Pike, drummer (and Middletown, Conn. native) Des Kensel and bassist Jeff Matz (who replaced Joe Preston in 2005) — has built a deep, pulverizing back-catalog: six full-length albums (including 2005’s “Blessed Black Wings,” which was produced by Steve Albini), several EPs, a few live documents and a handful of singles and videos.
In the mid-’90s, Kensel, a college student at Southern Connecticut State University (and later Central), played drums for Mindwar, a heavy band with a solid reputation and gigs mostly around New Haven. Other than an extended trip to Europe, not much else was happening. “Because of personal matters and everyone’s head space in the band, it was kind of at a standstill,” Kensel said. “So I just took my drums, threw them in my car and started driving.” Kensel ran out of money in San Francisco; he stayed for two years, then moved to Oakland. “Oakland was a bit more of the kind of scene that I was hanging out with in New Haven, a bit more underground, a bit more rough around the edges.”
Close to calling it quits, a friend introduced Kensel to Pike, who played guitar for Sleep, an influential stoner/doom metal band from San Jose who’d just split up. (Sleep reformed in 2009, with Pike still on board.) Over a couple beers and jamming, Kensel and Pike clicked. “We were just kind of laughing, checking each other out, and we just knew,” Kensel said. “It was kind of a funny, because he just came walking out of his house, and he had a mullet at the time, and he was wearing a flannel shirt, and I was just like, ‘What[‘s up] with this dude, man?’ I kind of grew my hair out and had this chin beard, and he was kind of laughing at me, probably thinking the same thing.”
High on Fire’s sludgy, lo-fi first album, “The Art of Self Defense,” came out in 2000 (it was re-released by Southern Lord Records in 2012). Their reputation grew with each release and tour; subsequent albums were significantly better in recording quality, but no less sinister. High on Fire has since opened shows for Megadeth, Opeth, Motorhead and Metallica, and although Pike, who has never worn a shirt onstage, required a stint in rehab after 2012’s “De Vermis Mysteriis,” he — and by extension, the band — currently sounds better than ever.
When this tour ends, Kensel said, High on Fire will start work on its seventh album in Salem, Mass. (a metal town) with Converge guitarist/producer Kurt Ballou. The tour itself is meant to get the band in shape for recording. “You’re playing in front of people, you got that little adrenaline rush going, and you play straight for an hour, 60 or 75 minutes,” Kensel said. “Playing live for a week and a half will get us a lot more physically prepared than say, just jamming on a song a little bit in a rehearsal space, where it’s like, ‘Let’s go take a coffee break, I’m kind of hungry,’ you know?”
Regarding the new High on Fire album, not much is known. The band is hesitant to play unreleased songs on tour; someone will record them (poorly) and foist them on unsuspecting YouTube gawkers.
What’s known is this: Some songs are going to be really, really fast, and others will be slow.
“I don’t know why, as we get older, we play faster and really try to hurt ourselves,” Kensel said. “There’s gonna be some of that… And we’re thinking to ourselves, well, maybe we should get some more in the early High on Fire days, the slower, groovier riffs that people can latch on to. So it’s gonna be a mix.”
HIGH ON FIRE performs on Saturday, Jan. 10, at the Webster Underground in Hartford, with special guests Windhand and Mountain of Wizard. Doors open at 6 p.m. Tickets are $16 to $18. Information: webstertheater.com.
