Annandale Hotel, Sydney, NSW
5th February, 2009

Canada’s Black Mountain are a band of many peaks and valleys and they brought their retro psych rock sound to the Annandale for the second of two packed nights. On the back of last year’s In The Future they hypnotised the audience with a big, bold and at times deafening set that covered all corners of their music.

In support were locals The Wahas, a rag tag bunch of young men who kicked off things with a brash and snotty mix of jangling garage rock with pop melodies and plenty of raw exuberant attitude. There is a gothic element to their songs, mainly in the vocals that are shared between three of the band. Shades of Bowie, Joe Strummer and Ian McCulloch of Echo and the Bunnymen all came to mind at different points, but variety worked in their favour especially when the screams from bassist Jack Freeman served to energise the music. Their set veered wildly from song to song, and at times their posturing was a little forced, but behind all that there is no doubting they have the intent and the ideas to create some interesting music.

It was impressive to see the size of the crowd that had turned out for Black Mountain. They are a band that doesn’t have the commercial appeal of Wolfmother or the visual marketability of White Stripes but they make up for that by delivering songs that range from the most primal basic rock through to gorgeous weaving psych folk. Main man Stephen McBean has many outlets for his music, he also heads Pink Mountaintops and collaborates with a wide group of Vancouver associates, but it is Black Mountain that is the greatest vehicle for his songwriting.

The impossibly huge ‘Druganaut’ from 2005’s self titled album got things started with its mix of Sabbath riffs, stop start rhythm and funk groove. The sound at the Annandale is quite impressive for a rectangular bunker and it was great that music of this type didn’t get suffocated by the small space. It still sounded gloriously massive. In The Future provided many of the highlights of the show with ‘Stormy High’ reaching mammoth Zeppelin peaks while later in the set ‘Angels’ brought things back down to earth with its warm and soothing vocal melodies and rambling feel.

There was a curious dynamic on stage as McBean, the obvious leader, stood stage left while singer Amber Webber was front and centre, offering her unique warbling sweet voice whenever it was needed to either complement McBean or stand on its own. On the slow burning ‘Wucan’ they traded lines that built a tension that never arrived, the key to what made the song such a success live. On ‘Queens Will Play’ her dramatic shaking voice played off the organ and created a dark drama that was perhaps her strongest moment of the night. Webber brings a hazier, stoned vibe to the songs while always slowly nodding or swaying to the music.

Evil Ways came across like the lovechild of Queens Of The Stone Age and Deep Purple with its dark boogie and galloping drums leading the way for the psych keyboards to create a myriad of squeals and stabbing notes. The way that the band could fall from the sonic peak of their most bombastic songs to a hushed and tripping folk tune is what makes them standout and prevents them from becoming a retro rock act in terms of pastiche.
Black Mountain showed the full range of their musical abilities and they demonstrated that restraint is just as important and effective as the heaviest of rock. The crowd responded loudly and at one point even one of the Annandale owners was spotted with fist pumping the air. They were unfairly overlooked in many end of year lists so it was rewarding that seeing them live added another dimension to their persona that makes it well worth revisiting In The Future.