High On Fire stormed into the Gramercy Theatre in New York on April 9th and had a sold out crowd whipping with fury throughout their entire set. High On Fire is touring in support of their new release “Snakes For The Divine” and played the majority of the album during the course of their 13 song set as well as old favorites from each of their albums. The night opened with “Frost Hammer” off the new album and the crowd immediately started breaking out into a frenzy. Matt Pike and Jeff Matz showed strong presence on stage and although they had little to say throughout the set in between songs, they commanded attention and deserved respect with their performance. They didn’t have any onstage gimmicks, this was a straight up old school set up of 3 band members, their banner, and stage lights.
Pike’s voice and guitar skill was fierce throughout the performance, Matz’s bass tone was album quality, and Des Kensel’s drum work could have been set to a metronome as his timekeeping was dead on. The mix of new and old was superb with a lead in of “Fireface” from their first album “The Art of Self Defense” right into “Commeth Down Hessian” from “Blessed Black Wings.” The new material sounded as good if not better than on the album and had the crowd singing along the entire time. The main set closed with the title track from the new album and resulted in significant headbanging.
The encore consisted of “Bastard Samurai” and “Fury Whip” and left the crowd begging for more. “Bastard Samurai” is as powerful live as on the album with its slow progression and lurking presence and “Fury Whip,” which was previously embedded in the main set earlier in the tour but closed the show this time, was a tease as it easily could have opened an entire new set with the reaction it drew. You would never have known it was being played at the end of a 90 minute performance between the energy still coming from the band and the crowd.
All in all, if you have a chance to check out High On Fire when they come through your town, get out there and see them, you won’t be disappointed.
–Deuce \m/

Setlist:
Frost Hammer
Devilution
How Dark We Pray
Hung, Drawn and Quartered
Rumors of War
The Yeti
Fire, Flood and Plague
Fireface
Commeth Down Hessian
Blood From Zion
Snakes For The Divine
———————
Bastard Samurai
Fury Whip