I lived with my buddy Jack when I was 18 years old and he is the reason I first heard the album Roots. It was and still is one of the heaviest/grooviest albums I have ever heard. Max and Igor Cavalera decided to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the Sepultura album Roots by getting back together to play the entire album. I never got to see Sepultura when Max was with them so I REALLY wanted to cash in on this once-in-a -lifetime chance at redemption. I ended up going to this show because I was not able to go see them at Aftershock 2016 like I originally intended. At first they were just going to play a number of festivals but thankfully decided to add more dates. Phoenix was one of those dates, which worked out great since that date was on a Friday, Phoenix is within driving distance from San Diego and our good friend Ken had moved back out there at the beginning of the year. One of Ingrid’s best friends also lives in the Phoenix area so we decided to make a weekend trip out of it. Bob somehow got a hall pass for the weekend and joined our little road trip as well.
Oh yeah did I mention that Max was pulling double duty for this show by playing a set with Soulfly before playing the entire Roots album? Even better since I had never gotten to see Soulfly either. There were actually seven other bands as well as this date was sort of a mini-festival but all we cared about was Soulfly and “Sepultura.”
Club Red is tucked into an unsuspecting strip mall in Mesa and holds about 750 people. It was actually fairly nice inside and had an ample bar area to get drinks. Ken, Bob and I arrived with just enough time to grab a drink before Soulfly went on. About half of the Soulfly set was from the albums Primitive and Prophecy. Killer.
Up next and certainly last was the almighty Roots album not only being played in full, but in order! I thought I would hang at the back part of the pit area so I could control the mosh a little more but immediately caught a stray arm to the mouth so I quickly switched gears and went through the pit up to very front where I stayed for the entirety of the set. I was pleasantly surprised to see that the bearded wonder Johny Chow from Stone Sour was filling in on bass for this tour. These songs took on even more life being played live in a small venue and bodies never stopped moving. Life is good.
SETLIST: Roots Bloody Roots, Attitude, Cut-Throat, Ratamahatta, Breed Apart, Straighthate, Spit, Lookaway, Dusted, Born Stubborn, Jasco, Itsari, Ambush, Endangered Species, Dictatorshit, Ace of Spades (Motorhead cover), Wings (Soulfly cover)
