Superjoint Ritual

House of Blues, Anaheim

After putting up with two fairly crappy bands and waiting an extraordinarily long time between sets, I was not in the best of spirits when Superjoint Ritual finally hit the stage. Hoping for some kick-ass metal and a fair amount of headbanging, I unfortunately got the latter of the two. The crowd there to see the band appreciated their music a hell of a lot more than I did. They weren't bad mind you, they played well and had a decent stage presence, but I've seen so many other better bands of late that they just paled in comparison. For me I either want a good show up on stage or failing that some good hard loud music ... they really didn't deliver on either of those fronts for me. The crowd of inked-up pierced-up fucked-up angry young men and boys seemed to disagree with me as they turned the pit into a swirl of swinging arms and jumping and pushing around. There was even some stage diving going on, which is a rarity at the HOB. I don't know.... I won't go see them again anytime soon, but they weren't all that bad either. I guess if you already like their music (and I admit I'm not all that familiar with their material) they probably are a pretty good act to catch. For me however, the Ritual was more of an ordeal than anything.

You can find Superjoint's homepage here.