The Black Angels Fitzgerald's May 24, 2013

Every once in a blue moon, a concert experience is so confusing and outside of the norm that it almost doesn't make sense. Friday night's Black Angels show at Fitzgerald's was one of those times.

The Austin retro-psych band is a dry-martini-and-cigarette kind of group, the antithesis of anything high-energy or anthem-heavy. The sound borders on redundant, but in a dense and haunting kind of way, a musical abyss full of dark undercurrents, thumping bass lines, screeching guitar riffs, eerie organ notes, and heavily pounded drums.

The Angels have become notable not only for that narcotic sound, but also for their capability to put on one hell of a live show, despite being the opposite of what one would consider high-energy. There are no gimmicks or tricks; the only aspect of a "show" the band incorporates into their concerts -- apart from their musicianship -- is a myriad of visual stimulation courtesy of some trippy projections.

Friday was no exception. As soon as the band launched into their opening number, a quiet crash of sound came down around us, and the crazy projections and mirror tricks swirling and dancing around us began to create quite a hypnotic sensation.

Given the right circumstances, this could make for quite an intense concert experience, but Friday the combination quickly became overwhelming. After two or three songs, the drone-heavy sound and those never-ending visuals created this deeply mellowed state where everything began to blur together, even without the help of mind-altering substances.

That blur, as trippy and trance-inducing as it is, is also quite unfortunate, really. Front man Alex Maas has an interesting, raw yet ethereal quality to his voice that is reminiscent of Grace Slick (really), but it can get overwhelmed among the show's other components, leaving it difficult to discern where the music ended and his vocals began.

The monotony of the Angels' psych-induced trance was only broken when Maas would scream inexplicably into the microphone at just the right moment to crack the spell, if only briefly. The vocal ebb and flow from the alternate moments of screaming and singing made for quite an interesting ride; we'd fall deeply under the spell of the band's drawn-out, enchanting sound, and then Maas would launch us back into reality at his will.

He used that power carefully, though, breaking the lull at precisely the right moments. He was never jarring or overwhelming, but his moan had just enough of a human quality to remind us that we were not on another planet (or in another dimension, for that matter).

Maas wasn't the only surreal player on that stage, either. Guitarist Christian Bland is quite an interesting character to watch. As he plays, he seems to be an extension of his instrument, or it simply another one of his appendages. Either way, Bland seemed enmeshed with his instrument in a way one can only be if he or she has become a master of the art and playing becomes second nature.