Helmet

SnoCore 2005 Tour /Newport Music Hall /Columbus, Ohio/ 2.16.05

 Review and Photography: Rob Kern

Detroit, 1993:  Following a Detroit Tiger baseball game my friends and I stopped at a quickie mart in the Motor City to grab gas and beer for the ride home.  Located in one of the many areas of Detroit earmarked for the expansion of the city’s lucrative crack and hooker trade, the multiple out-of-towners gassing up just wanted to quickly pay the cashier and prayed they wouldn’t get shot on their short journey back to the car. 

At the end of a ten-person deep line, I stood waiting to check out, sporting my favorite Helmet tee, when suddenly the older, hippie-something burnout manning the cash register ceased collecting money from the impatient customers and emerged from behind his 3-inch-thick wall of bulletproof glass.  As all looked on in amazement and irritation, our slightly addled cashier ambled up to me, shook my hand and said, “Helmet rules dude…” 

A dozen years later I find myself at the MTV2 SnoCore tour wondering if Helmet still does rule, dude.  Seven years had passed between 1996’s Aftertaste and 2004’s Size Matters.  Hell, entire genres have started and died in that time, would anyone still give two shakes about a reformed Helmet, especially a lineup lacking longtime band mates Henry Bogdan and John Stanier?  No better way to find out than by hooking up on a tour with a lineup composed of bands whose members were still in junior high school when Helmet first broke through. 

The SnoCore tour provides a daunting challenge for lead singer/guitarist Page Hamilton and the men of Helmet: playing for a crowd of younger fans who are there mainly to see headliners, Chevelle.  As opening acts Strata, Future Leaders of the World and Crossfade warm up the crowd to varying degrees of success, I chat with random attendees about Helmet. 

“Weren’t they a grunge band?”, “I’ve heard the name but not any of their music.”, “I think my older brother used to listen to them, are they good?” are just a few of the confused statements I hear rippling about.  This could be a rocky set, I think to myself. 

Page Hamilton and company wasted none of their allotted forty-five minutes as they kicked off with “Pure” and established a heavy groove that lasted the entire set.  The Helmet lineup of Page Hamilton on vocals and guitar, Chris Traynor (guitar), Frank Bello (bass) and John Tempesta (drums) may be older than the rest of the bands at SnoCore but they were easily the most energetic band of the night.  Chris Traynor played to the crowd as he complemented Page’s thick, precise riffs, while Frank Bello and John Tempesta started and stopped the beats on a dime.  Bassist Frank Bello careened about the stage like a man half his age, firing up the crowd in between mosh breaks.  His former band Anthrax should have their heads examined for letting him go, Frank is a one man wrecking crew of energy.  A seven-year layoff would be the death knell for many bands, not so for Helmet.  Not a single hint of lethargy or cobwebs were to be found in the meaty riffs and intense lyrics of Page Hamilton. 

A few new tunes from Size Matters were sprinkled in the set as the unfamiliar in the crowd began to warm to the idea of Helmet 2005.  For the diehards, “Wilma’s Rainbow” and “In The Meantime” kept things going as the crowd went from body surfing to flashing the devil’s horns at the band.  A final blast of “Unsung” wrapped up an all too short set.  Chevelle may have been the headliners but Helmet did a fine job of showing the nu-metal fans just where it all began. 

As Chevelle came out and batted cleanup, I made my way back to the merchandise booth and spotted a young convert pulling a brand spanking new Helmet tee over his head.  I walked up to him, shook his hand and said, “Helmet rules dude…”

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