Portal "swarth"

There aren't many bands than can unnerve me with a live performance. #portal is one of them.  A friend accompanied me to a metal show at the Mohawk Place in Buffalo.  We were excited to see black metallers Krallice and didn't really know anything about the other bands on the bill.  The club was not packed but the people that were there were all into the fringes of metal.  I had heard rumblings that dude who runs Profound Lore records was there (impeccable metal record label, you can throw a dart at their catalog and hit an awesome album) so we started getting excited about the show.  I did my customary trip to the merch tables.   I love when bands bring stuff by other bands, like a travelling underground record store.  I bought CDs by everyone on the bill (including this one ) and started drinking cheap beer at the bar.  While I am a beer snob there is something mystical about metal (and punk) shows that makes cheap beer not only palatable but actually desirable.  So we watched the band's plow through their sets and were enjoying the evening  (and getting rather drunk) when the headliners Portal finally took the stage.  All of the lights were turned off except for two red bulbs, the band took the stage dressed all in black with black sacks over their heads and large nooses tied around their necks.  The kicked into a blackened noise of arpeggio riffs and the vocalist took the stage in a black pope's outfit with a sheer opaque black mask over his face.  The vocalist made grand gestures while grotesquely grumbling over the din.  I was raised Roman catholic and the entire scene was obscene and unsettling.  I loved it. Ghost came out a couple years later and while I enjoy their similar aesthetic it seems like a Kiss Army characature compared to Portal.  My friend and I had no idea what we were in store for.  We were mesmerized by the unlistenable experience.  This disc and this band are only vaguely musical.  All of the necessary rock instruments are present but the band plays a roaring vacuum,  not songs.  They feel menacing and evil but sound like nothing else.  I can't say I love this cd.  I can say it changed how I appreciate the artistic aesthetic of music.