Right, if I asked you to imagine space, astronauts, and grand sounding music it’d be hard not think about the great 1998 film Armageddon with Aerosmith, but instead you should be thinking about the Ohio band Starset. As some of you may not be aware of Starset here’s a brief run down of who they are and what they are about:
Starset are an American thematic rock band who say to be in the genre “cinematic rock”. On their official Facebook page the band explain their fictitious backstory as this:
“In the early hours of New Years Day 2013, a radio astronomer at the Allen Telescope Array in northern California discovered a mysterious signal emanating from a star within the Ophiuchus Constellation.
Contained within the signal was a Message–of human origin–foretelling the details of man’s imminent demise. The Message was brought to The Starset Society, who quickly realized the importance of its immediate publication.
Risking extreme danger, The Starset Society commissioned a group of musicians and scientists to assist them in spreading the knowledge to a broader audience. This group became known simply as STARSET.”
And to give you a taste of what they sound like here is one of their first singles that brought them into the lime light:
So now you’re all caught up with who and what are Starset are let’s talk about the show which took place at the O2 Institute (or like me still know it as the HMV Institute) in Birmingham. Interestingly, the support act was a DJ (Diskord – dance music that has “heavy” tones), which appeared to go down quite mixed with fans. To my left I had a group of older people who complained that it “It’s not real music, manufactured S**t” while to my right I had some young twenty-somethings who were dancing along so it was safe to say it was a mixed reception. Well I certainly enjoyed it, if not finding it a little weird to have such an act support a rock band. See what you think below:
Mentioning the crowd once more though, I think the overall gig was let down by the lack of audience participation. By that I mean almost nobody was throwing their hands in the air, banging their heads, or jumping round. I can appreciate that not all concerts need to have a mosh pit (in fact I can get irritated by them) but the overall energy of the crowd was a little lacklustre which was disappointing, until of course the lead single closed off the night.
Once Diskord had finished his set it was finally time to painstakingly wait for the final sound checks to be done and for Starset to come on stage, although I must admit it didn’t actually take that long compared to other concerts I’ve been to. Needless to say I was very impressed, I knew from promotional material and press that the whole ‘astronaut’ look was their gimmick, but I was surprised to see it was a style they continued to keep throughout the entire set, unlike other masked artists like Hollywood Undead who will remove the masks after a few songs.
The outfits really helped add to the whole ‘scientific-space’ influence they had, even if they did resemble a laser quest team on stage with their flashing lights, it was fresh to see. That being said I think to extenuate the light up outfits the band wished for the stage to be quite dark, which yes did make all the outfits look amazing in the dark. However, it did mean that the vocalist, Dustin Bates, was pretty hard to see which kind of sucks when you pay to ‘see’ a band.
Let’s talk about the setlist, probably one of the most important decisions a band can make before embarking on a tour, what to include and what to exclude. I guess the benefit Starset have is that they only have two albums to choose from which also means there’s a good chance many fan favourites will be picked to be played live, it’s a win-win for everyone. So songs such as My Demons, Monster, Halo, Ricochet, It Has Begun, and Point of No Return were all played live and all sounded just as huge as they do on the albums. Which I must say is one thing I think Starset have been able to do really well, is to create songs that have a grand vibe about them, something reminiscent of movie soundtracks but with heavy riffs and electronic influences – similar to how the latest Bring Me The Horizon record That’s The Spirit features some songs that just feel epic in proportions regardless if it’s your cup of tea or not.
Focusing on that point of sound though it must be noted that through most of the set the vocals were overpowered by pretty much every other element of the show, whilst the vocals did sound great, the only sounded great when they could be heard. For example if you didn’t know the song you’d have no idea what the lyrics were supposed to be as all you’d be able to hear are the instrumentals – but this was something that appeared to be addressed towards the latter half of the show. Speaking of instrumentals, on stage were two talented musicians touring with the band who played the violin and the cello, this, I must admit, did add a whole other element to the stage show. Normally such instrumentals would be on a backing track so to see them live and play along side with the band was appreciated by everyone in the crowd as it’s not a normal sight to see.
In conclusion though I would highly recommend seeing Starset live if you ever get the chance to, they seem to be doing something I’ve not seen bands be able to carry off so well. Fusing together both heavy guitar tones and huge atmospheric soundscapes to create grand level music that just resonates with the listener – or maybe I’m a bit biased? Despite the potential ‘technical’ issues the overall concert itself was a great show and was one that was definitely entertaining to watch, even if you don’t think the music is your ‘thing’ just give it a chance as I think Starset are a welcome breath of fresh air to the scene.
Also they have a telescope available at the merch table… ’nuff said!
I’d give the gig:
