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<< Front page Arts November 7, 2003
 
Rapturous marathon
The Rapture exudes energy and insanity

Tuesday night at the ’Sco marked one of the busiest and best concerts that have come to Oberlin in quite some time. It was slightly past 10:30 p.m. when the first band, Gil Mantera’s Party Dream, marched into the ’Sco to begin their show. The men, dressed as women in ’80s era clothing, were met with cheers of surprise and anticipation.

Gil Mantera’s Party Dream filled the next hour with a mix of odd impersonations, beer tossing, singing in robotic languages and swearing. One of the lead vocalists had a thing for the robotic voice in particular and played with a modifier on his microphone for nearly the entire concert—he even went so far as to use it to address the crowd.

Their music was fresh and crisp hard rock with lyrics that were harsh as well as thought provoking—full of swearing and rage. This anger towards the rest of the world exposed itself when the band was informed that since they had started late they had time for only one more song. The lead singer erupted in a five-minute rampage, cussing out the band-sitter and challenging the staff to step up to him after he’d been “hitting the weights for three months.” Of course, the crowd was eating this up…

Late in the concert, the ’80s clothes came off to reveal yet another surprise – gold g-strings. Rather unexpected to say the least, the g-strings combined with the musicians’ beer-drenched state was a sight to behold.

Immediately following Gil Mantera’s Party Dream, the main attraction, The Rapture, opened. Having a mere hour before the ’Sco closed, they set out on a marathon: as many songs as possible, no breaks, even less talking to the crowd.

The band opened with a bang, blasting sounds that can only be described as electrifying. The guitars blended with the drums in a sizzling rhythm that graces the stage of the ’Sco only a few times a year, while the vocals and lyrics blew through with a coordinated assault on everyone’s hearing.

After a grueling hour of non-stop playing, the Rapture finally completed their show, to the screaming, shouting and applause of the crowd. It was a paradox of sorts to hear a band of such immense style and class such as the Rapture following the crude ruckus of Gil Mantera’s Party Dream, but this was just another reason that the concert, for lack of a better term, rocked.