Review & photos by Andrew Bansal
March 23rd 2016, The El Rey Theatre, Los Angeles CA: Austin, Texas stoner rock quartet The Sword released their adventurous fifth full-length studio album ‘High Country’ in 2015, an effort that sees them push their creative and stylistic boundaries like never before. While it isn’t the kind of record that captured fans’ imagination straightaway, the band’s incredible live performance of this material has played a major part in eventually winning fans over. This was evident at the Southern California stop on the first North American headline tour in support of ‘High Country’ tour last fall, at the Glass House in Pomona. Now, the band is touring North America again for an extensive run to further promote their latest endeavor, with support on the first part of the tour provided by Royal Thunder, and by Purson on the second part. The Sword and Royal Thunder arrived in Los Angeles for a gig at the El Rey Theatre on Wednesday March 23rd, and it promised to be a memorable event for the city’s stoner rock faithful that had turned up in good numbers.
Doors opened at 8 PM, and Atlanta, Georgia stoner/psychedelic rock quartet Royal Thunder took the stage at 9 for a 45-minute set that absolutely floored the audience. My last and only time seeing Royal Thunder live was in 2013 at the House Of Blues Sunset Strip, where oddly enough, they were main support to Monster Magnet, and what’s more, frontwoman Mlny Parsons was clearly ill on that occasion, which affected her performance. Finally, four years after getting hooked onto this band in 2012 upon listening to their debut full-length ‘CVI’ and staying hooked through the follow-up 2015 LP ‘Crooked Doors’, I got my first real live Royal Thunder experience, and it was everything I had built up in my head as the best representation of this band in a live setting. This time, Parsons was most certainly at the peak of her powers both on vocals and bass, as was guitarist and founder Josh Weaver, his fellow axeman Will Fiore, and drummer Evan Diprima. Putting forth a mind-bending set of tunes from both LPs, and even going back to the 2011 self-titled debut EP with a delightful rendition of ‘Mouth Of Fire’. As a singer, Parsons was pouring her heart and soul into this set, hitting all the right notes and wowing fans and first-timers alike. Royal Thunder is a gem of a band that deserves much greater attention than what it gets. Judging by this performance, the band is sounding exemplarily amazing, serving to be the ideal support act for The Sword, and need to be seen live by every single reader.
At 10:15, The Sword hit the stage and threw a curveball at the audience straightaway, as the ‘Unicorn Farm’ intro off of ‘High Country’ was played on the PA before they appeared on stage, but then they opened with ‘Cloak Of Feathers’ off of ‘Apocryphon’ instead of track #2 on High Country, which came much later in the show. The set this time was dominated by the latest album even more than the previous tour, with as many as 11 High Country tracks, mixed in appropriately with songs off of ‘Apocryphon’ and ‘Warp Riders’, as the music on these albums fits better with the new material than the band’s first two full-length releases. That being said, they did include three early-years tunes ‘Maiden, Mother & Crone’, ‘The Horned Goddess’ and ‘Freya’.
Guitarist/vocalist J.D. Cronise, lead guitarist Kyle Shutt, bassist Bryan Richie and drummer Jimmy Vela were raring to go right from the outset, and hit their individual as well as collective groove from the moment they stepped on stage. The Sword have now been in existence as a successful band for more than 12 years, and all those years of experience are beginning to take effect, as the band is blossoming into greatness, not only defying trends but battling their own past work to keep themselves motivated to create new things on each album. But more than anything, The Sword makes fans with their live show, and they proved as much with this gig, satiating a packed house at the El Rey to the fullest with their newfound brand of chilled-out stoner rock. With albums like ‘High Country’ which tightens its grip on the listener every single time, The Sword is here to stay, and while their next creative step is already eagerly awaited, Los Angeles would have no complaints if they kept coming back a few more times in support of ‘High Country’ for another year or two.
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Set List:
Intro: Unicorn Farm
01. Cloak of Feathers
02. The Dreamthieves
03. Tres Brujas
04. High Country
05. Buzzards
06. Maiden, Mother & Crone
07. The Horned Goddess
08. Tears Like Diamonds
09. Mist & Shadow
10. Night City
11. Seven Sisters
12. Empty Temples
13. The Bees of Spring
14. Freya
15. The Hidden Masters
Encore:
16. Agartha
17. Suffer No Fools
18. Seriously Mysterious
19. Lawless Lands
Remaining Tour Dates:
First Leg (w/ Royal Thunder)
04/01 – Saskatoon, SK – O’Brians Event Center
04/02 – Winnipeg, MB – Pyramid Cabaret
04/03 – Fargo, ND – The Aquarium
04/04 – Des Moines, IA – Wooly’s
04/05 – Chicago, IL – Thalia Hall
04/07 – Milwaukee, WI – Eagles Hall
04/08 – Indianapolis, IN – The Vogue
04/10 – Rochester, NY – Montage Music Hall
04/11 – Ottawa, ON – Ritual
04/12 – London, ON – London Music Hall
04/14 – Quebec City, QC – Le Cercle
04/15 – Northampton, MA – Pearl Street Night Club
04/16 – Washington, D.C. – DC BRAU
Second Leg (w/ Purson)
05/07 – Charlotte, NC – Carolina Rebellion*
05/08 – Tallahassee, FL – Sidebar Theater
05/10 – Ft Lauderdale, FL – Culture Room
05/11 – Orlando, FL – The Social
05/12 – Pensacola, FL – Vinyl
05/13 – Atlanta, GA – Shaky Knees*
05/16 – Baltimore, MD – Ottobar
05/17 – Brooklyn, NY – Brooklyn Bowl
05/18 – Syracuse, NY – Lost Horizon
05/20 – Philadelphia, PA – Union Transfer
05/22 – Columbus, OH – Rock On The Range*
05/24 – Columbia, MO – Blue Note
05/25 – Lincoln, NE – Bourbon Theater
05/26 – Lawrence, KS – Granada
05/27 – Pryor, OK – Rocklahoma*
05/28 – Dallas, TX – Gas Monkey Live
*festival dates