Playing to a sold-out crowd -- with arguably the band's best lineup ever -- The Melvins came dangerously close to wreaking structural damage to Chicago's Double Door on September 28.
For this tour, founding members Buzz Osbourne and Dale Crover enlisted the services of newcomers (and openers) Big Business, forming a formidable dual-drummer foursome. The result was a sound so intensely heavy that light couldn't escape. The two drummers mirrored each other (Big Business drummer Coady Willis is a lefty, and his kit was joined together with Dale Crover's), locked in a precise militaristic unison. Jared Warren's thick, heavy bass provided just the right counterpoint to the wall of sound coming from lead Melvin Buzz Osborne's Les Paul (it was hard to believe there was just one guitarist on stage).
The set list included lots old favorites (many from the band's 1996 classic, Houdini) as well as a healthy portion from A Senile Animal, set to be released October 10. The show concluded with a marathon dual of the drummers, which ended in a draw. Nobody dared ask for an encore.
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