'Anthrax' never sounded so good

08:51 AM EDT on Friday, September 30, 2005

BY RICK MASSIMO
Journal Pop Music Writer

PROVIDENCE -- You don't have to go far to hear contemporary pop music in which people mope. And it's pretty easy to hear the cartoonish near-celebrations of anger in nu-metal, rap metal, death metal, etc. It's been rare lately, however, to hear music that has a steady, unnerving malevolence -- the kind that actually feels good. But Gang of Four are back.

Starting an American tour last night at Lupo's Heartbreak Hotel, the reconstituted British quartet played most of their first album, 1979's Entertainment! (which has become the template for a slew of today's big rock deals such as Franz Ferdinand and Bloc Party), and a few songs from later records.

As with the forthcoming record Return the Gift, which contains re-recordings of old songs, the live performance allowed guitarist Andy Gill to let loose in relation to the group's clipped, lo-fidelity classic recordings. And he took full advantage, knifing through songs with a skinny guitar sound, staccato phrasing and more-than-occasional feedback squawks (most notably on "Anthrax" and "To Hell with Poverty"), as well as a baleful scowl on his face. The "Anthrax" intro was particularly impressive, with Gill wringing atonal swoops out of his guitar by bending and twisting the neck and body.

Frontman Jon King shouted and declaimed like a man about half his age, delivering lyrical takedowns of romance ("Love'll get you like a case of anthrax/ And that's one thing I don't want to catch" from "Anthrax"), capitalist culture ("This heaven gives me migraine" from "Natural's Not In It"). All the while he leaped, wiggled and did an approximation of tai chi. And "He'd Send in the Army," sung by Allen and Gill, featured King keeping time by pounding on a microwave oven with a baseball bat.

All the while, drummer Hugo Burnham and bassist Dave Allen pounded out dance-floor rhythms as filtered through a bleak British industrial landscape -- danceable but more chilling than celebratory. "To Hell With Poverty" came straight from Eurodisco, for example, while "At Home He's a Tourist" is what the Talking Heads could've sounded like if they hadn't settled for quirky. But at the same time, rockers such as "Damaged Goods" and "I Found That Essence Rare" were hard-charging.

Anytime a long-dead band reunites, there's a fear that they won't clear the bar of their older work, and that, like Willie Mays flopping around in center field, their older selves will ruin fans' memories. Sure, there were one or two first-night-of-the-tour glitches. But last night, Gang of Four proved themselves every bit as energetic, and as vital, as a quarter-century ago.