Metal Regression

I know what you’re thinking: “NO fucking way Jairo, a Slayer pit is the most BRUTAL.” That wasn’t what you were thinking? okay uh… is it “Cannibal Corpse pit bro, I lost a hand in one.” Still not it? Okay you must be thinking “Metal?! PSH you’ll get fatal diseases from just standing near a punk pit”

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Alright man I’m not a damn mind reader what do you want from me? Oh right, this post.

I saw Meshuggah recently (hours ago actually at the time of this writing) and I know there’s this ongoing joke within the community “lol you can’t headbang or mosh to a Meshuggah song, it’s too weird”. There is a whole world of videos trying to mash Meshuggah’s songs to different dances. Just to give you a timely taste:

But it’s not true, these pits are so fucking dangerous. You have people trying to mosh without rhythm….like they’re trying to avoid giant sandworms. I had the “fortune” of having the pit open up right on top of me while at the concert. I got pushed to the back wall, and I didn’t want to move because I had a good view damnit. I’m used to standing next to pit, and just shoving along anyone who gets too close. But this time I was getting hurt all over the place and found myself flinching like a little mitch almost the entire show. Before I lose whatever small pittance of cred I’ve developed though let me explain the shit I was seeing. In a regular ass circle pit, all you have to worry about is moving in a circle, it can get varying degrees of rough but no one is gonna surprise with a punch to the gut or a foot in your ribs. but here..man…here I was seeing people get weird with it. Every time Fredrik and co. shifted grooves people reacted by violently launching their limbs in separate directions. It was like the band was playing QWOP and the dancers in the pit were the character on the screen:

like this but faster, and more violent

So  that in of itself is kind of a weird way to mosh but it’s definitely not the worst. You can safeguard yourself by keeping track of the shifting bodies, making sure you catch the moshers and send them along. But where this enters nightmare territory is with the strobe lights. Meshuggah have an AWESOME stage show, and it involves tons of lasers and lights. They particularly love to use the strobe. Have you ever danced in a strobe light? it’s like you’re seeing little freeze frames of people moving around. Now imagine those people are moshing, coming at you unpredictably  while you’re temporarily blinded. It’s like in call of duty where the military force throws a flash grenade, breaches a room and instead of shooting everyone in the head proceeds to mosh with the blinded enemy. Now imagine me getting blinded by the strobe lights while I try to daredevil the crap out of the darkened bodies and limbs rocketing around me. I got slammed into, stepped on, and hit so many times. I had to assume the emergency protection position: one hand firmly cupped over my genitals and the other arm raised against whatever may ram into me from the front.

Cup your hand and cover up. NWH say, grab. your. stuff.

The Coup De Grace to the whole thing is the bane of any indoor mosh pit: The spilt beer. Oh yeah, all these poor guys trying to get the other side of the pit only to have Meshuggah start the strobing, blinding death dance in the middle of their jouney means that the beer they so desperately were trying to save was spilled all over the floor of the pit. This only exacerbated the problem. All the dancers were now slip and sliding into my shins while I sat there trying to Mr. Magoo my way through the song.  At this point I probably should have just left the pit for safe zone but I was in too deep, I could show no signs of weakness! War is hell man, but damn…it was a good show.