Kicking off the night of music, Misyrion delivered a punchy performance. The four piece worked together to make an environment of chaos through technically proficient and eerie instrumentation. A stand out was the delivery of the double kick with the drums, resonating through the Rickshaw. The vocalist used their harsh vocals to emphasize the theatrics of the instruments and also carried the guttural delivery in between songs for a comedic effect that was felt throughout the audience. I was surprised go discover that it was their first show as a band and that they were local to the Vancouver community. Their live performance truly held its own to amp up the crowd for the rest of the night.
LIONS AT THE GATE
With a relatively quick change over, Lions At the Gate took the stage next. There was an initial atmosphere developed from the back lighting that haloed the band as they delivered an operatic performance. There was a distinct passion in the faces of the performers, and most dominantly the vocalist and drummer. It was clear how deeply they felt the message of their music, moving with purpose. As a group, they were lively and true showmen, taking moments to work the camera, as well as engaged with the crowd. They were whippiing around dreads, their guitars, and sticking out their tongues as far as they possibly could to create this engagement on top of their instrumentation.
NITA STRAUSS
Having only been in Vancouver with other acts, it was a true pleasure to witness Nita Strauss take the stage with her solo band for the first time in the city. Every aspect of her performance was dialed in to this perfect balance of visual and technical performance. The intro music started booming as the light movers started whipping around from the corners of the stage as well as the towers next to the drum set. These white spotlights swung round and round, highlighting the backdrop preparing everyone for the main event that they came for: Nita Strauss. Her band took to the stage, holding their hands up in acknowledgement before Nina came in, and walked across the full stage without saying a word and just going full fledge into her guitar.
While playing through her guitar with great practiced precision, she banged her head with her hair floating all around her. At different moments, she’d find herself standing over and the wedges, pulling at the guitar strings as her hands slowly got closer together from the sweeps brought down the neck of the guitar. In moments of pause, she’d make eye contact with the crowd, or swing her hand upwards in moments of choreography from her assisting guitarists. There was this perfect understanding and unison between them all, something that was truly felt from the pure instrumentation since the mic was only being used for a few moments between songs.
At the time of the show, Nita Strauss commented that there were only five more days until her upcoming record would be released. Now, at the time of sharing this, we are only a short two days away from the release but still with a new single, “The Golden Trail” available to listen to. The Call To The Void is set to be released on July 7th of 2023. If you happen to be able to catch a show before then, be prepared for a perfect mixture of the old and the brand new, but don’t miss out on the release of the record on its own.
