Gillyis Thunderhead

with Sam Black Church at The Underground
by Scott Hefflon

It had been a while since I’d seen Sam Black Church. Their new CD, Super Christ, is due out any day now on the now-California-based Taang! Records. Even at 7:30 PM on a Sunday night, the level of adrenaline in the room was dangerous, borderline psychotic. That’s the power of SBC. While Jet was throwing water on the crowd or inadvertently ripping the low, suspended ceiling down as he crowd-surfed, he was also concerned with the well-being of the audience. Gosh, it was touching. Jet did his jungle gym thing, climbing on anything that looked remotely climbable, and the crowd passed back the debris in his wake. Their signature guitar sound, which usually sounds like an enormous toilet flushing (that’s kind of a good thing), never sounded so heavy. Either the sound system in this place is great, or someone got through to guitarist Ben Crandall that a little bottom end to his sound would be a good thing. The crowd included hardcore kids in hats, Goth girls in black, flannel grungesters, metal boys in leather, and tattooed muscleheads. Everyone sweated. Everyone slammed. No one fought. While I’m not an advocate of the new, PC peace-in-the-pit whining (toughen up, girls!), having no fights kept the show moving and the tension level high.

Opening band, Gillyis Thunderhead, has come a long way. A year ago, they sounded like mud and sang about corpses. Borrowing a bit of Sam Black Church’s scream/ranting, using huge group-yells, and a hella lotta demon roar, Gillyis Thunderhead finally get with the decade and produce monstrous metal you’ll be hearing more of in the future. Now about the name…