The Dub Trio: Let Your Heavies Out

Main Act: Dub Trio
Opening acts: Witchburn, Middle Class Rut, Black Cobra
Venue: El Corazon
Date: December 1, 2008

Let me start by saying that I don’t think I have ever attended a heavier show in my life. The Dub Trio play a masterful combination of Dub Reggae and Heavy Metal and both these genres together make for some extremely low-tone music. This was also one of the weirdest concerts I have ever attended because there was nobody there. You know that feeling that you get at some shows where it feels like you’re the only person in the audience? Well, at this show, you really were the only person in the audience. There were only about fifteen people at the show and being at El Corazon, the place was far from packed, which was actually pretty cool. The crowd was extremely chill and there were no psychos or super-fans to distract from the band. There was one guy who was clearly hopped up on something but he mostly kept to himself and didn’t bother the rest of us.

It was also cool to be as close as I was to the band. I’ve been in front of concerts before but never at El Corazon which allowed me a totally unobstructed view of the band’s performance. The Dub Trio knows how to throw down, being, again, probably the heaviest band I’ve ever seen. All three of them are skilled musicians, but it’s their drummer who really caught my ear. I don’t know why, probably because the drums were my first love, I’ve always paid close attention to drummers and this guy was a piece of metal. It pays to be patient when playing Dub and the drummer was both patient and powerful, putting his share of the weight into the mix. This band is a trio, though, and no member really takes center stage. There are no solo wankers, just team players and their cohesiveness was amazing to witness. Dub is difficult to do live as evidenced by the sea of effect pedals laid out before the guitar player. I can’t even begin to guess what they did or if he even used them all-but a lot of what I saw was him looping his guitar. It was cool. He did have some trouble: one of his toys-a magnet used to stimulate the guitar strings-didn’t seem to work that night, but he had plenty of other tools to warp his guitar into new and unusual sounds.

While I enjoyed the Dub a lot, I really liked their Metal. These guys are heavier then a granite slab and make bands like Metallica look downright kittenish. Speaking of Metallica, my friends and I speculated on the lack of crowd density and realized, after the show was over, that both Metallica and the Wu-Tang Clan had been in town that night as well. What’s more, it was Monday night and the Dub Trio don’t exactly fit into the Metal or Dub worlds perfectly, so they’re without the built-in fan base that doing just one of those things might allow for. It’s a real shame because they’re much better then Metallica and deserve to be known by more people. All these factors make it even more impressive that the Trio gave the show their all even with so few people in the crowd. After it was over, the drummer came out and thanked us all for coming and for not going to the Metallica show. No problem my friend, no problem. The best tracks they played include Bay Vs Leonard, Not For Nothing and No Flag.