The only band of this year’s Dour festival that I had never seen before and I was curious about witnessing live was the U.S. freakcore outfit An Albatross. After reviewing their highly interesting The An Albatross Family Album I was curious to find out how these guys hold up in a live environment, so I ventured down to a small youth centre called Bazart in The Hague to see them.

Opening act was Eva Braun, who annoyed the piss out of me. It was sort of like a feeble attempt to recreate something in the vein of Made Out Of Babies, only they missed skilled and impressive musicians. There was a girl drumming, which in 90% of all cases is a bad thing (and no I'm not prejudiced, I’m realistic), a guy trying to play the guitar and a girl trying to do panicking and hysteric vocals while making desperate facial expressions. It made me mad. That’s not a good thing, but it’s all I have to say about this performance before I go and cross the line of decency again.

 

Luckily things changed quickly when the guys of An Albatross took the stage and blew the crowd away with their spastic freakcore. There was a variety of songs I actually recognized, yet to see them do it live really blows you away. All the musicians have mastered their instruments very well, it was really cool to see the bassist, guitarist and keyboardist play the same technical fucked up loops together. I was pleasantly surprised by the keyboardist’s Hammond organ, which is not really something you expect in a mathcore/freak band, yet it worked like a charm. Also I noticed that a whole lot of those bizarre noises actually come from the guitarist, who almost uses his instrument like an extension of his body. Add to this freakfest a semi-crazy vocalist that accidentally (I think) fell off the stage and you’ve got yourself an excellent party. If you ever have the chance to se them live, I suggest you do so. People going to the Dour festival this year definitely need to go see them!