Banner photo credit: Edvard Hansson & Brendan Baldwin
Syncopation, polyrhythms, and time signatures you need a sextant to calculate – these are what make Messhugah the drug of choice for those suffering from the monotony of standard ballads. Since 1998, the swedes from Umeå have been creating increasingly intricate metal that challenges even those best versed in music theory to keep track of measures and bars. And if you’re one of the very few musicians who can confidently replicate Messhugah,I have good news for those seeking to expand their daily supplements of Sweden’s most complex export: a visual show so beautifully intense and captivating, a sizeable warning to attendees is prominently placed at the entrance to the venue stating: WARNING, FLASHING LIGHTS. They weren’t kidding – I left the venue seeing stars, hearing multiple songs at once, and sensing a rattle in my bones I was worried was permanent. If you missed them a city near you then I’m happy to report that their show at The Theater, Madison Square Garden on Thursday, April 24th was recorded and will forever be a prime example of what a metal showcase can be when every element of spectacle is considered.
Regardless of where you fall on the love-hate spectrum of djent, it’s undeniable that 30 years and an entire subgenre to your credit is a feat for which few bands other than Messhugah can claim. Starting in 1987, and originally known as Metallien, the band changed their name right around the time of their first demo to be a derivative of “crazy” in Yiddish, a term that lead singer and band originator, Jens Kidman found in a “dictionary of American slang,” according to an MTV article from 2004. I have to say, as an American Jew who can hear their mother wantonly exclaiming that my sister and I made her “meshuggenah”, I thought Messhugah would be the perfect way to bridge my love of metal to my parent’s winding road of acceptance. I think most of us in the scene can assume that didn’t work at all, but I do remember my dad, a former music engineer admitting that the guys have chops. Whether you’re a music theorist or not, anyone who is assaulted by the dissonant rhythm of multi-time-signatures only to be firmly planted back to equilibrium knows that something special is happening. Meshuggah is like the porn of metal: you know it when you see it, and it doesn’t always look how you expect. Whether you’re turned on or not is an entirely different article that I may one day write.
I had my doubts when I first found out Messhugah was playing The Theater at MSG. Technical death metal at a seated venue? The last time I had seen them was in the pit at the Hammerstein Ballroom in Manhattan in 2019. The pit was impossible to decipher, with seemingly no discernable edge, and the attendees were, a word: entranced. It was one of the most beautiful physical experiences I’ve had at a show, with no need to fear for life or limb, and absolute trust in the shared awe among fans. Anyone caught in rough waters may have heard that it’s best not to fight the current, and by the time the mouth of the Messhugah river met 48th street in Midtown I was drenched in a chemical mix of human sweat and felt like I had been completely cleansed.
Well let me tell you: assigned seating or not, it makes no difference for this latest tour. The band had complete control of the crowd from the moment they struck their first note of “Broken Cog”. With the exception of a pit as described above, not a single person moved from their position. Feet were firmly planted while heads, arms and jaws slackened into a frenzy among fans. It’s an accomplishment when your technical death / progressive metal chops are such that time and space become entirely theoretical.
With a setlist of 11 songs, each extending well past 5 minutes, the entire experience was a flurry of alternating time signatures accompanied by an impossible to predict lightshow. I think it’s important to lay this out: I have once witnessed anything like the visual element I saw that with Meshuggah. In spite of already being one of the most innovative groups of the past 30 years, Meshuggah has found a way to enhance an already singular experience. The synesthesia of the entire night kept building, always keeping the audience on their toes as color palettes evolved, linear shapes took on organic forms, and visual show forged its own path of polyrhythm that made every last drop of my serotonin completely evaporate by the set’s end.
Take “Kaleidoscope”, for example: just as one begins to calm and believe the performance is winding down, the lights reemerge with a wanton force to accompany an already entrancing guitar solo. What had originally been a wall of green now encompassed blues and reds in a way my eyes were completely unprepared for. And it wasn’t just the rhythm or innumerable sections to the songs that goaded the lasers into dance – every effect of the mixboard, with particular bias toward phasers and delay pedals entranced the lightshow into three dimensional shapes just above the heads of those in the pit. All of these elements came together to make the simpler sections of Meshuggah’s catalog stand out that much more. At one point I looked down and saw the pit jumping up and down in a classic pogo as if I had suddenly been transported to a pop punk pit. Now that's a breadth of musical talent right there.
It’s worth noting just how much music Meshuggah has in their discography with over 30 years behind them. The setlist however never dipped earlier than 2008, with a bevy of songs from ObZen. When you have as much music as this and as dedicated a fan base as Messhugahheads it’s important to curate. Even if there was a fan in the crowd disappointed not to hear anything from their 90s catalog, I’m sure all was forgiven when the band hit the first song of their encore: everyone was ready to “Bleed”. Check out the video below to witness the blanket of silence cast across the crowd just before an explosion of energy to usher in the final tracks of the set.
Meshuggah has had an outsized impact on metal and those with a love of frenetic structures. The evolution of sense-assault to encompass our visual cortex in addition to our sense of sound makes them the perfect drug. You can only seek to score some Meshuggah if you get tickets here.