Friday 14/03/08 The Mars Volta @ Brixton Academy, London

As the famous Elvis Costello quote goes, 'writing about music is like dancing about architecture' and there’s no better example of the writers challenge than the one posed by The Mars Volta last Friday at the Brixton Academy - how do you sum up 180 minutes of music delivered on a gargantuan scale (by a band whose conventions defy comparison) in mere words?

With no support acts to worry about, a brave move considering the one-band onslaught that was to come, The Mars Volta, led by an androgynous Cedric Bixler-Zavala and the dapper Omar Rodríguez-Lopez, strode into a packed Brixton Academy and surveyed their room mates for the next two-and-a-half hours.  What was to come would require a dissertation to summarise in even vague detail, but such a document would start with how the eight-piece band mixed together a seemingly ill-advised musical trifle layered with Rush-style vocals, ripping guitar solos © Jimmy Page, powerful Latin rhythms, prog-inspired half-hour-long jams and large wedges of ambient noise in an unrelenting set to confound and amaze the sold-out auditorium.  Progressive jazz influences were also prevalent during the many between-song breakdowns but, at times, the sheer scale was too much for one audience on one night; some of what they attempted just didn't work musically in that enclosed environment and after two hours, even the most enthused fans looked a little tired with The Mars Volta's unwavering prog agenda.

However, playing for so long and in such a manner also bred an atmosphere that was reminiscent of a festival, where it doesn't matter if you want to take a break from the musical barrage because you know there's still about three gigs worth of music to be played. A band doing things in the normal fashion would belt out hits for 50 minutes and a mistimed break will probably mean missing something important, thus a more relaxed atmosphere fell upon the cavernous Academy as the evening progressed; it was one of satisfied appreciation rather than sharply focused attention on a band's every move.

The final act started with a furious ‘Inertiatic ESP’ (the closest thing the Mars Volta have to a pop song) and ended with a scaled-up version of ‘Drunkship of Lanterns’ played, once again, as though their lives depended on producing the most intricately woven mass of music that finally draws together into a cohesive form after meandering down numerous dark alleys and hurdling several vicious peaks. Just as it sounded like the music was lost in the noise, it all came good.

CLICK HERE to see a full gallery of the gig.