The Mars Volta
Festival Hall, Melbourne
Monday 25th January 2010
A band trading off the fumes of a decade-old explosion are always going to reach the point when the buzz tails off and they're forced to start again. For the lucky few, that's a good thing. With reinvention comes fresh motivation (and new record deals). That chapter can't come soon enough for The Mars Volta, who despite releasing three albums in a row of self-contained space-noodling, are still rubbing up awkwardly against ancient history.
With their fan base split between corduroy-wearing Yes fans and At The Drive In nostalgia seekers, vocalist Cedric Bixler-Zavala and right-hand man Omar Rodriguez-Lopez have staked their strong preference for boundary pushing and the sense of limbo on Monday was palpable. If there was a support act I didn't see them, despite what the ticket stub claimed. Instead The Mars Volta wandered onstage at 8:35pm to a two-fifths full Festival Hall amid idle chatter and mariachi music with sun still streaming through the emergency exits.
Confronted with the awful prospect of an insular four hour wig-out, the sense of dread lifted as rapid fire opener 'Son et Lumiere' melded neatly into 'Inertiatic esp', the first two tracks from the six-year old De-Loused in the Comatorium, and for many their first memory of the Zavala's iconic whine. The mic-toting vocalist can still pull off a solid shreik and for a moment it was back to Bush's America and an escalating Iraq war.
The immediate follow-up, recent groove-heavy single 'Cotopaxi', managed to keep heads nodding live despite its irritating slickness on record. But sadly, this opening assault was the high point -- for the next 120 minutes the band resembled an glassed-in exhibit at the Melbourne Museum with the energy ebbing and flowing but never properly taking over. A complete lack of between song banter added to the sense that Zavala and co were oblivious to the occasion or more charitably lost in the moment -- not nearly good enough with ticket prices topping $80.
And audience skittishness wasn't helped by the appearance of a roadie ambling on stage in the middle of each song to deliver what looked like bottomless cups of steaming coffee on a stool to Zavala's left (I counted 18 ignored top-ups as the show wore on, that while not quite in the lines-off-a-hooker's-arse-crack league, didn't do much to counter the palpable sense of posturing).
Meandering wailers like 'Since We've Been Wrong' and 'Halo of Nembutals' from last year's Octahedron stretched out to over 10 minutes and seemed too earnest in the intervals and too much like sub-Cheap Trick blow-ups at the climax. If the queues were any indication, many took the opportunity to scout around for more beer to speed things up. Although the breakdowns on 'Teflon' were saluted by the remaining faithful, there was a tangible feeling of longing for pay-offs that never came, despite the efforts of new drummer Dave Elitch, who perhaps had something to prove. The rest of the band, for whatever reason, seem to have lost that burning ambition, that while it could be glazed over on record amid thickets of bedroom bong mist, didn't translate well to a Monday night audience baying for blood, and an encore that never came.
Andrew Crook
(Pics: Matthew Miller)