When the first word coming off the stage is "destroy!" you know where the night is headed, and that this destination isn't up for negotiation. When the scream it's attached to encourages the room to rhythmically leap for the sky and start fist pumping like it was being pulled up by some crazed puppeteer, you know that The Bloody Beetroots - Death Crew 77 are in town. Relentless. Blistering. Frenetic. All of these words only begin to describe the transfer of energy I saw exchanged between the audience and that Venom masked group of leather jacket wearing electro-hounds up on stage. The Roseland was just another world they came to conquer, and they were going to do it, even if a few ears had to wake up in the ER.
One look at opener James Renegade’s name might suggest that he belonged amongst these fired-up Italians, as “renegade” is quite fitting to the image the Beetroots and their music is dying to project; however, after an hour of listening to his house-meets-dubstep-meets-progressive mix, I can assure you he didn’t. He wasn’t aggressive enough; his music had no balls, no dark domain that might call out the beast in you. That’s what would have been an appropriate layer for this show - that or a hardcore band. Was he bad? No, he was adequate, and adequate is just that.
The soundscape he played with was paint-by-numbers electro: water drops, slip ‘n’ slide sirens a la Major Lazer, fragmented pieces of Euro rave vocals and a looped call to “throw your freakin’ hands up!” That last request wasn’t necessary since the half-filled floor had already been doing that since his first drop. These kids came to lose themselves; I just couldn’t figure out whether they were pro-Renegade or just a bunch of pushovers, excited for anything that came out of those speakers. Assuming the former, I won’t deny that the last fifteen minutes of his set killed. Somehow, after an ok beginning and a repetitive middle section, he had managed to slither through the grass and position himself like a Cobra lusting for the strike. And then without warning, he dropped a bunch of high voltage jams. Analytical me now says, “Why did you save this?” Concert me said nothing and started celebrating like a child with a pillowcase full of Halloween candy. I won’t say that it made up for the melodically disjointed transitions or the factory line construction of his tracks, but it did give me a second wind, and I needed that for what was coming up next.
A minute after hitting the stage, the Bloody Beetroots laid claim to our movement and never let go. The culprit was "Domino," and by the time the end-over-end synth line collided with the word "destroy!" the floor had effectively turned into a mess of jumping bodies. Most bands go for a couple of these moments per show, The Bloody Beetroots try to sustain this peak for the entirety of their set. Because they are successful, the crowd continues to get crazier and crazier with each passing moment. There are no kind moments of banter with the audience, no stop button--only bangers in a Beetroots set. And you can't help but love them for it; they know what the crowd wants, and they make sure that they get it.
Sir Bob "Cornelius" Rifo is the leader of this outfit, and while he rarely sings (if he does, he screams in a way a hardcore punk singer might), he knows exactly how to keep the audience thinking his show is batshit insane. His methods are familiar, but well executed: the stage stalk, the air splits off an elevated position, the half-exposed face screaming from a Venom mask, the spitting and chucking of water in the air. When all of these things are aligned to beat drops and power moments, you have the makings of a good showman. Rifo is exactly that, and the high drama he uses to thicken up an already overdriven sound creates a heaviness that is guaranteed to draw the aggression out of you. Watching this all go down, I became intrigued by how the Beetroots had managed to harness the darkness and frenzy of hardcore punk music and blend it seamlessly into an electronically focused show. The incorporation of hardcore elements didn't inspire moshing though. Not that I'm a strong purveyor of moshing, but because I grew up going to metal shows, I've been trained to expect a pit to emerge when the music charges at you. Instead, Rifo and co. are guiding a style that taps into our aggressive urges, without also unleashing any of the violent ones that live next door. Unexpected under the tenets of social logic, but fantastic for the atmosphere of a show.
The best comparison to their current sound will always be Justice, as both groups have married anthemic electro to a hard edge. In Justice's case, the hard edge is the incorporation of metal; in the Beetroots' it's hardcore punk. Another similarity - besides the crossover bait melodies inherent to each group's compositions - is the use of dark, church tones. The Beetroots put these to best use during the beginning of "Cornelius," a track that made the crowd go so nuts, that one fan decided he not only had to climb to the top of a rack of speakers, but he also had to mischievously hang from some scaffolding attached to the ceiling. Security threw him out as soon as they could get him down. The song carried on and out in the crowd, we continued giving ourselves over to the power of coerced yells, fast-moving lasers and grinding synths. These church overtones returned in the middle section of "Warp 1.9," which unsurprisingly was the biggest song of the night; but it was when they dropped that mammoth synth that everything exploded out on the floor. Even the balcony was going off. The volume alone would have made anyone pay attention, but it was the futuristic groove that was responsible for setting you off and making you want to dip into another zone, or for some in the audience, relish the altered state you were already in. This is why the grapevine has been going on and on about DC77's live sets, this is why our photographer (Jasper) never lost that look of childish glee in his eyes. On this tour, everybody gets more than what they came for.
And this tour, the first under the new Death Crew 77 moniker - which basically means that Rifo is now playing guitar and bass on top of his synth duties, and that a drummer named Edward Grinch has been added to fill out the backend previously controlled only by their DJ, Tommy Tea - is fantastic, in both energy and execution, but it also is a reminder that the Beetroots are still building. Yes, people compare them to Justice and notice that they love Daft Punk as much as the rest of us (pretty sure they sampled and/or jacked part of "Robot Rock" in there somewhere), but Rifo still hasn't had his Discovery-type moment yet. Which is fine, since they are a fairly new group and we often make the mistake of expecting perfection out of the gate. That said, the pieces that are already there suggest that this is a band to watch. Definitely go to their concerts (because they trump their albums by a mile), but watch them as they progress, as well. Rifo has an ear for what will make you dance, and once he learns how to lay off some of the tones that don't work with that sound (bad glossy keys), he might just surprise us with a masterpiece. Until then, run to this tour. I promise you'll remember what you see for a long time.
