Post-Hardcore Band Black Eyes Reuniting After 20 Years

Black Eyes have returned! Many people won’t understand what that line means, but if you’ve ever had the chance to watch the ferociously percussionist DC band live, you already know how significant this is.

There is some excellent music on the two Black Eyes CDs that Dischord issued in the early 2000s.

Records pale in comparison to the tightly focused percussion attack of the band’s live performances, which featured two bassists, two drummers, and a guy who shrieked loudly while fumbling with a guitar or a cowbell. Back in the day, many saw Black Eyes perform at independent concerts in Baltimore, and those concerts frequently tore the skin off everyone’s face.

Black Eyes only existed from 2001 to 2003, which is a fairly brief timeframe. In 2004, the band had already disbanded when their second album, Cough, was released. Daniel Martin-McCormick, the band’s leader, has released experimental dance music under the identities Mi Ami and Ital after the dissolution of the group, and Jacob Long, one of the two bassists, launched the instrumental project Earthen Sea.

However, the band has already revealed plans for three East Coast performances and Dischord is preparing a 20th anniversary reissue of Black Eyes’ self-titled 2003 debut. Below, check out the dates and some live-show footage that can’t possibly capture the experience of being there in the room.

4/07 – Washington, DC @ Black Cat
4/08 – Brooklyn, NY @ Market Hotel
4/09 – Philadelphia, PA @ First Unitarian Church

For more background on Black Eyes, the band’s new bio reads:

The group formed in 2001 and quickly became notorious for their visceral, percussion-heavy live performances. With two drummers, two bassists, two vocalists, one guitarist bolstered by an array of auxiliary percussion, the five piece blended exuberantly danceable post punk with an abrasive, caustic wildness inspired in equal measure by hardcore, free jazz, and 20th century composition. Singers Hugh McElroy and Daniel Martin-McCormick wove breathless tirades around each other, building densely-layred lyrical deluges exploring trauma, the crisis of masculinity, queer sexuality, a post 9-11 political landscape and the early rumblings of 21st century fascism. Drummers Mike Kanin and Dan Caldas engineered a roiling rhythmic interplay that maintained a tight groove as often as it erupted in furious explosions. Bassist-turned-saxophonist Jacob Long and McElroy meanwhile weighted the rhythm with thick, dubby undertows and punctuated it with springy, lithe countermelodies, while Martin-McCormick unleashed sprays of flinty chaos on guitar. Their tenure as a band lasted a mere two-and-a-half years, but in that short time they left a lasting mark on the punk underground. Across exactly 200 shows and two albums on Dischord (2003’s S/T and 2004’s Cough), the group insistently maintained a feverish, experimental energy that ran counter to the happy-to-be-commodified spirit of the era. Album tracks like “Deformative,” “A Pack of Wolves” and “Someone Has His Fingers Broken” became anthems to those who know, while the blinding energy of their live shows left audiences stunned.”