Friends, I absolutely jumped at the chance to shoot and review this show. Part nostalgia, part curiosity, part understanding what I was diving into (more on that below), the opportunity to see a band like KMFDM perform 40 years after they helped to pioneer not just a sound, but a genre and a subculture, was a no-brainer.
When I was in high school, I had several really great groups of friends. For whatever reason, the folks I tended to run around with the most were a couple years older than me and one of the groups I spent the most time with could be found more often than not driving around listening to music and trying to find somewhere to skateboard. My buddy Ash was a massive fan of industrial and goth, so bands like KMFDM, Skinny Puppy, Nine Inch Nails, wumpscut, and Meat Beat Manifesto were on regular rotation in whatever minivan or shitty Toyota one of them had managed to commandeer from their parents.
I’m fairly certain I was able to catch KMFDM at Bogart’s back in the day, but regardless, I was genuinely stoked to get the chance to see them all these years later.
Ahead of KMFDM’s performance, Morlocks, a quartet of Swedish goth/industrial hellions, took the stage for an energetic, entertaining, and oddly fun set that helped get the crowd ready for the aural thrashing on deck. Their 45-minute set featured vocal performances by 3 out of 4 members, chugging guitars, a captivating front person, and plenty of metal-ish programmed drums jumping out of the sound system. This was the band’s first time here and only their second time in the U.S., so I genuinely hope they had as much fun as we did while they were on stage - it sure as hell seemed that way.
What followed was a brutal escapade through 40 years of thrashy, heavy, intense and sometimes beautiful music, performed by one of the genre’s originators, KMFDM.
From the start, this was a measured, well-paced, all-out assault courtesy of one of the longest-running industrial acts around. It felt like they were easing themselves, not just the audience, into what was going to unfold - it wasn’t quiet, quite the opposite, but it would be another several songs before they dove into some of their more chaotic tracks.
As a band, from a stage presence perspective, it wasn’t necessarily a spectacle, but it certainly wasn’t boring. Vocalist and sole original member Sascha Konietzko and vocalist/keyboardist Lucia Cifarelli often traded places as the focal point of any particular song, with a few instances of stepping out from behind their podiums and working the crowd together happening every few songs. The lighting setup, the fluidity and overall makeup of the setlist, and the crowd all seemed to mix exceptionally well - the night, as a whole, was as noisy and fun as it was well-oiled and balanced catalog-wise.
A few things of note: I was genuinely surprised by the age range present last night. I had assumed it would be mostly folks my age or older, so I was pleasantly confused by seeing so many concert-goers in their teens and early 20s, especially as they were sans parents. The crowd, also - and I honestly hadn’t thought about it until walking through it all last night - was also one of the more diverse I’ve seen in a while. I forgot about how inclusivity was built into a large swatch of the industrial/goth movement, so was happy to see that was still the case.
Catching KMFDM on their 40-year celebration tour was pretty much what I hoped it would be - MegaCorp Pavilion was filled with folks who weren’t there for the sake of nostalgia, they were there because they’re still fans, still in love with industrial, still enjoy KMFDM, and they wanted to share it with way more people than I would have anticipated. Also, KMFDM is just really damn good live. But, also, they are *loud.* Bring earplugs. You’re not as young as you used to be.
