Gojira can't reproduce their own music live... bleh!

This is one of the things that I have always kind of appreciated about metal. For the most part outside of a couple of exceptions, metal bands are able to put on a pretty exact replica of their album music in a live environment. However, there are a few instances in which bands that I otherwise like have a beautiful song that they don't ever perform live. They make a bunch of excuses for why that is and they are all bullshit of course. The reason reason is that they made a song in a studio, where they have unlimited takes and in the process they ended up making something that is above the ability levels of the people in the band.

I expect this of pop acts who are lip syncing half the time anyway but it really pisses me off when this invades my favorite genre of music.

Gojira: Born in Winter

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Gojira is a French band whose songs are primarily in English. The took the metal scene by storm and went from playing tiny clubs to sharing stages with the likes of Metallica in just a few years. I don't know if they have run out of ideas but recently, I became aware of an absolutely epic song by them came out in 2014 and I can't get it out of my head because it is that amazing.

There is no doubt that this is an incredibly complicated song on guitar and I have seen a few videos of people who have replicated it at home playing along with a backing track. I can understand that there are probably only a few people in the world that can play this extremely complicated guitar riff that is just all over the place and doesn't even use traditional picking mechanics either.

This person is clearly very talented but they are also performing this from a seated position and they had as many cracks at getting this right before they uploaded it. On stage you don't get do-overs and this I think is why Gojira has NEVER performed this song live. Singer and guitarist Joe Duplantier has stated that the reason they don't play it is because of the vocals being deeper than he can do on stage and I'm calling bullhicky on this. It doesn't really matter to me because if you can't sing the song outside of a studio that really isn't any different than not being able to play it on guitar.

I remember years ago that there was a very popular song that wasn't really in my wheelhouse that was called "The Reason" by Hoobastank and this song became a hit. Obviously it was what people were looking most forward to when going to see them live but there was a catch. The singer can't hit the high notes in the song and instead holds the microphone out to the crowd for them to sing for him at the high bits. Cheeky buggers!

I could go on and on about how other bands that I really like such as Dimmu Borgir must have so many backing tracks when they play live that it becomes difficult to determine if the band is actually playing anything at all. Are they? It wouldn't be that difficult for them to just not have the guitars amplified and everyone is just playing air guitar.

Let's stay on topic though. I still really like Gojira and a lot of their other songs they can and do play live but I think that if your album is metal or even rock, you fucking better be able to play these songs live or don't put them on the album.

The above performance of Stranded is using a lot of effects on the microphone. I can hear them. This is fine. Everyone does this but there is only so much magic that a soundboard can pull off. I'm still not buying the "the verse is too deep for me to do on stage" excuse for never playing "Born in Winter" live though because i think the fans would be ok with a vocals backing track to do the low bits if that is actually the problem.

I think Gojira is bullshitting us and actually isn't capable of playing their own song... and that's a damn shame.