Down – Astoria 2006

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“It’s ten years since me and Rex (Brown) have been to these shores,” says Philip Anselmo. This of course raised a few eyebrows in the packed Astoria as both Phil and Rex had been here with their previous band, Pantera, in 2000, but we’re all used to Phil’s “unique” banter by now. 45-minute intro movies and a regular length show billed as an “Evening with” on the other hand…

Indeed, as astoundingly psyched as every member of the band clearly were, and as awesome as their performance was, there were some things fundamentally wrong with this show that a band which toured more regularly would not have gotten away with. But the return of Down, the phenomenal coming together of metal heavyweights Phil and Rex from Pantera, Pepper Keenan from Corrosion of Conformity, Kirk Windstein from Crowbar/Valume Nob and Jimmy Bower of Eyehategod, was such a highly anticipated and long-awaited event that they could probably have come out, played Dixie Chicks covers all night and gotten a mighty roar for their efforts.

The problems I had with this show were two-fold. Firstly, this was billed as an “Evening with Down”. This means no support act, which there wasn’t, and an extra long show. Which, again, there wasn’t. Instead, and this is the second problem, we had to sit through a 45-minute pre-show movie, which was great and very entertaining for about fifteen minutes, but that was all. Said movie consisted of TV-recordings of some of the greatest bands in rock history, all of which are obviously influences on the members of Down. Each of these recordings were one song from a performance. It was good that these songs were played in full, but there were just too many of them. Between the cuts from the likes of Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin, KISS and Lynyrd Skynyrd were home-video style clips of Down in the studio or playing around elsewhere. Similar to the kind of thing on the Pantera home-videos. One clip showed the band walking out onto the stage at a festival and I thought for all the World that at that moment they would walk onto the stage for real. Seemed sensible to me. But it wasn’t to be, as the video went on for another quarter of an hour. As I said, for about fifteen minutes this was great, but for 45 minutes it quickly became apparent that this was merely a straight replacement for a support act, and Down’s set was going to be no longer than your average gig. And indeed it wasn’t, just about two hours long.

To further add to this irritation, something everyone in the building fully expected: the Philip Anselmo show is still very much about wasting time. Telling the crowd to keep making noise constantly and making them shout was great a couple of times. But after every single song was starting to get tedious. How about doing something to give us reason to shout? Like play a song, perhaps? For all of Phil’s babbling we could have had at least three more songs, and there were some great songs conspicuously absent from the set, including Beautifully Depressed, Stained Glass Cross, Dog Tired and Hail The Leaf. Phil’s chat wasn’t as bad as I’ve heard reports of it being in the past, where he’s rambled drunkenly for ten minutes at a time, and for that I’m thankful, but it was still too much.

All that said, the band were so very good that it nearly made up for these problems. I say nearly, because with them being that great, I wanted to hear more songs. Aside from Rex Brown (bass) strutting around the stage like he owned the place (or “like a c**t”, in the words of the guy next to me) the band were tight as you could hope for, playing off each other with effortless ease, even to the point where Kirk Windstein (guitar) could wander off down the stage and Rex would operate his effects pedals while playing his own bass lines. Guitarist Pepper Keenan was simply legendary, every riff and every note played with total passion. Even Phil was so excited and impassioned to be on that stage playing those songs with that band that his hip-hop-style posturing and gestures came across as genuine signs of his enjoyment and enthrallment in the occasion.

The main set was a mixture of live favourites and lesser-played tracks, including obvious selections Ghosts Along The Mississippi, Life (dedicated to “Dimebag” Darrell Abbott) and Temptation’s Wings alongside less predictable tracks including Lies, I Don’t Know What They Say But…, which followed a short jam of Led Zeppelin’s Dazed And Confused, Underneath Everything and Something On My Side which hadn’t been played on the European tour up to that point.

For the first encore the hand-drums came out for an unlikely rendition of the ethereal Jail. Now I’d have thought keeping the hand-drums out and breaking out the acoustic guitars for Stone The Crow before resuming normal service for Bury Me In Smoke would have been a good idea. However, the band left the stage again and when they returned, played a rather heavy version of Stone The Crow before leaving the stage for a third time. In all honesty, I don’t think this was a good move. Stone The Crow is a sombre song, very laid back. Playing it heavy all the way through did it no favours at all. The heavy-as-hell version of Bury Me In Smoke which followed however, eradicated any ill thoughts.

For the time they played, Down were simply untouchable and their passion and enthusiasm was off the chart. It was just unfortunate that a third of the proposed show was wasted with that pathetic intro movie.

“ legendary ”

Setlist: Lysergik Funeral Procession / Lifer / Losing All / Rehab / Ghosts Along The Mississippi > Learn From This Mistake / New Orleans Is A Dying Whore / Temptation’s Wings / Dazed And Confused > Lies, I Don’t Know What They Say But… / Underneath Everything / Something On My Side / Eyes of The South // Jail // Stone The Crow // Bury Me In Smoke

Written by Andy Lye
More: Gigs, Southern, Down