Cult Leader played Great Scott – 12/7

The late Friday night show at Great Scott earlier this month hosted an ultra-heavy bill headed by Salt Lake City’s Cult Leader with NYC’s Primitive Weapons and Stockholm’s God Mother. 

When I first saw Cult Leader – opening for The Dillinger Escape Plan at the Paradise back in 2016 – the band struck me as a nigh-incomprehensible force of sonic violence; equal parts vicious and mysterious. They are still all of those things, but the cozier confines of Great Scott are a much better place to get to know them. Fresh off the release of last month’s A Patient Man, the foursome rolled through Allston to deliver a pulverizing set of their sludgy, pitch-black hardcore, which also made room for some of the new record’s unexpected forays into bleak balladry. It was a range of dynamics you don’t see every day.

Brooklyn post-hardcore crew Primitive Weapons offered a sturdy set mid-bill, but the positively unhinged God Mother were undeniably the more eye-catching opener. Vocalist Sebastian Campbell made a playground of the room, diving off of bar stools and hanging from the ceiling while the rest of the band churned out a maelstrom of colorfully-influenced heaviness. Truly one of the wilder sets I’ve seen all year.

Check out photos of the whole night below.