Ageotan Pours One Out

Live Review

Dec 28

Black metal mavens Ageotan headlined a hard rocking bill at Midway Cafe on the night of Tuesday, 27 December 2022.

Vague Perception and Minx played in support.

The popular Jamaica Plain spot hosted a metal-adjacent evening in the strange twilight moment before the weekend’s New Year’s celebrations. It’s the calm before the storm, if New Year’s gets stormy for you. For many (excepting Kwanzaa fans) Tuesday might be a quiet lull perfect for celebrating nothing at all. Maybe a stay at home night. Definitely not a “do it up” night. But if the mood is right, the location close, and the cover charge fair, you can pull together a modest audience for a slate of metal bands at the Midway Cafe.

Metal bands rarely disappoint. In the idiom of fantasy footballers, they combine a “low ceiling” with a “high floor.”

On the “high floor” end of the spectrum, most metal musicians worthy of taking a stage can play their ax. The standard of musicianship is pretty high within the genre. Fans expect to hear chops capable of pulling off the stratospheric speed solos and the blistering drum breakdowns.

As for the “low ceiling,” metal gets a rap for being stuck in a creative rut since its heyday in the 1980s. Is it true? Not exactly. The genre has been pushing into some cool, experimental areas like the art metal of Sunn O))), nu metal, and the aesthetic adventurism of black metal. None of that hits the reset button, but it’s enough to show that ideas are still percolating hot and fresh within the genre.

Most importantly, metal bands bring good tidings of cheer in the holiday season. Viewed from afar, you might think the genre was full of darkness, depression, and depravity. Don’t believe the hype! Metal musicians have a healthy sense of humor about the aesthetic idiosyncrasies of their genre, love to have a good time, and are full of positivity. No Somergloom and doom here. Plus, they love the holidays. Just ask U.S. Christmas, Leper, Grim Christmas, and, of course, Christmas.

Minx

Boston’s Minx served up the bluesy, hard rock end of the metal spectrum. Shades of AC/DC, Bad Religion, Molly Hatchet, and Sons Lunaris. The kind of band that would fit right in at a biker bar in New Hampshire. The frontman dialed down the “leather daddy” look he’s brought to previous Midway Cafe gigs. It’s too bad, the pageantry is part of what makes metal great.

But the focus tonight was on heavy sounds and tight dynamics, which included intricate double- and triple-layer vocal harmonies. The band members were practicing their vocals in the back of the bar before the show, running through the hard bits like kids before the school play. Minx nailed it. They’ve got a new album coming, release date to be determined.

Vague Perception

Vague Perception has a sense for the theatrical. The four-piece out of Rhode Island have been enjoying themselves at gigs since 1984. In their own words, it’s been “30 years of doing this shit.”

On Tuesday night they teased the beginning of the set with a cover of The Stooges’ “I Wanna Be Your Dog”. Turned out to just be the soundcheck. The frontman excused himself and the band to get a proper buzz on outside before returning to perform their set.

Second time’s the charm. Vague Perception played dive bar-ready hard rock that had the look and feel of punk before the genre codified itself to a more narrow aesthetic. The frontman roamed around the pit in a black tutu with the word “Rotgut” printed on his back. Shades of David Lee Roth, New York Dolls, Moving Targets, and a can of Sterno.

If you missed the set, you missed the singer’s extended monologue about their drummer’s bad hip. The entire band will go on ice for a few months while the drummer recovers from upcoming hip surgery. Vague Perception closed with a song that was either about liver damage, or titled “Liver Damage”, or both.

Ageotan

Enough with the “adjacent” tag. Closer Ageotan was full metal, of the black metal subvariety. The band honored the Kiss-heritage with black & white makeup. Though they photograph as a four-piece online, they performed as a three-piece at Midway.

The first song on the setlist was designed to impress: a doomy, screamo ditty transformed into an epic, ten-minute long instrumental holocaust that woke everyone up. Shades of Junius.

Wondering what ‘ageotan’ means? The word is an old English verb meaning “to pour” or “to shed.” Give you one guess as to what’s getting poured or shed in the mind of black metal.