4 out of 5

Label: Sargent House, Dunk!Records

Produced by: Jannes Van Rossum (recorded by)

My criteria for judging live albums – remarked upon whenever I’m reviewing one – is pretty straightforward: does the recording offer something the studio version does not? That doesn’t have to be new material necessarily; even a tracklisting can be rewarding – if it acts like a Best Of in lieu of an actual Best Of, for example.

Russian Circles’ Live At Dunk!Fest double LP fits the bill of that particular, as it gathers about two tracks from every major release from Station to Guidance (the latest, at the time of the recording), and lays them out such that the album really flows from more grandiose stuff to rockers and back, purposefully sequencing the show for maximum effect. But let’s go back to my criteria of offering something the studio version doesn’t, and we’ll find a counter to one of my constant criticisms of the band: especially prior to working with Kurt Ballou, they’ve always been a bit too “safe”.

Although RC are now one of the biggest names in the instrumental metal scene, even starting with Enter, I always felt like they were kind of running in the wakes of others. Enter did some cringey generic chugga chugga stuff (we all gotta start somewhere…), and thereafter, the moves the band did on subsequent albums were kind of remixed snapshots of Pelican, ISIS, Red Sparowes and etc., getting loud and quiet on cue. The stuff is likeable if you’re a fan of any of those groups because it’s a perfect summary of all of them, it just relegated RC to always sounding like someone else.

I’m also a live show naysayer. I see no benefits to most live shows, with the number of acts who truly sound better that way pretty slim. (At least from a modern perspective – when music was harder to get, or perhaps recorded with less clarity, I can see having a different take.) But: Russian Circles sound great live. It allows for an intensity that’s kind of been produced away on the albums up to the point of Dunk!, and the timing quibbles that occasionally pop up (where a player falls behind ever so slightly) are also much more forgivable in this setting. When tracks veer a bit more towards the ethereal (309, Vorel), I’d probably argue for the album take offering more depth; those songs are not as immersive here, running into the flatness of most live recordings. On the whole, though, this is exactly the kind of experience that sells me: a group that’s mesmerizing and rocking – chatter is fully minimized on this recording, which is my preference – and overwhelms any judgments of “oh, they sound like so and so” through the sheer power of the music. I’d run to the merch table right after a show like this.

Not knocking a point off, but note that the LPs don’t quite fit into the jacket on my copy (a gatefold where the openings are just a bit too tight). The artwork is fun, though.