LIVE REVIEW: The Contortionist @ The Deaf Institute, Manchester

Since the release of their 2014 album Language, THE CONTORTIONIST have been reaching new heights of acclaim internationally with ambient, melodic and progressive new sounds. Their most recent release ‘Clairvoyant‘ was no exception to that and saw them touring the US and Australia with bands like SIKTH, SILENT PLANET and SKYHARBOR. We went down to see their show at Manchester’s The Deaf Institute, with support from PALM READER.

The small stage of The Deaf Institute did not leave much space for PALM READER to perform in front of all of the THE CONTORTIONIST‘s extensive gear, and therefore the audience were greeted by half of the support band on the stage, and the guitarists positioned in the pit in front of the stage. This, however, ended up wholly complimenting the atmosphere of the performance and the band’s gritty, heavy brand of melodic hardcore. Their recent release Braille saw a huge step up in form from previous material and earned them acclaim across multiple platforms. This was evident in their performance, with new songs like Swarm translating themselves into intense, well structured and emotional experiences. Despite being a very different band to the progressive melodies of the headliner, PALM READER certainly held their own with a relatively unreceptive crowd and fulfilled on the promise of Braille as a studio album.

Rating: 7/10

The crowd did not have to wait too long before THE CONTORTIONIST took to the stage in force, to the great anticipation of the crowd. It’s been a good while since the band did a full run of the UK, and for a lot of fans this may have been the first time seeing the band. This was reflected in the fact that much of the most positive reactions from the crowd were for the new material from Clairvoyant. It would have been remiss of the band to miss out the old material however, and classic headbangers such as Oscillator and Flourish took pride of place in the middle of the setlist. In between the old songs, the band improvised an incredibly heavy instrumental section with layered, distorted vocal ambience, which showed a small window into the past heavy nature of the band, and seemed to be appreciated by even the newer fans of the band. Much to the crowd’s delight, the encore was composed of the band’s magnum opus, Language Part 1 and Language Part 2. As usual, Michael Lessard’s vocals were incredible, defined by their ethereal, haunting melodies yet, it seems like the newer more melodic vocals have done nothing to affect his unclean vocals, as he roared out the old material. Another star of the show was the bass, with climbing and ascending bass-lines which thundered through the venue and shook the floor. Despite many old fans maybe being disappointed by the direction taken by the band on Clairvoyant, such a smooth, effortless and wide-ranging performance should be enough to assure them that THE CONTORTIONIST will always stay true to their roots.

Rating: 9/10

Check out our photo gallery from the night’s action in Manchester from Sabrina Ramdoyal Photography here: