King Buffalo - Live at the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts
The David Rubenstein Atrium at Lincoln Center might appear more like a hotel lobby than a venue about to host a hard rock concert...
It’s hard to not enjoy a free show… it’s not like you’re out anything other than the time if it’s a bust. The possibility of a subpar concert from a band like King Buffalo doesn’t even occur to me- having been the highlight of a dimly lit warehouse show that I actually paid for, I KNOW they’re capable of the type of performance one rarely has an opportunity to experience for free. But for a show like this to be held at the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, home of acclaimed classical music institutions like the New York Philharmonic and Metropolitan Opera… there might have been a hint of uncertainty - at least about what to expect.
About an hour before King Buffalo is scheduled to play, the David Rubenstein Atrium (named after a billionaire businessman / former vice-chairman of the Center’s board) is not exactly the scene you’d expect - a handful of fans in black t-shirts are wandering about and timidly approaching the venue’s polite staff with questions. Do we need to sit in the chairs or are we allowed to stand? If we leave, are we allowed back in? A Lincoln Center worker chatting with fans in line for the room’s only bathroom seems impressed that the band has brought their own sound person. “I ain’t sitting at a fuckin’ rock concert, don’t care where it is!” we hear someone passionately exclaim to their friend as the two mingle about waiting for the show to start. In a space that more closely resembles a hotel lobby than a hard rock venue, it’s a reassuring sign.
Sean McVay of King Buffalo performs with a nifty white telecaster w/ golden pickups.
A little after 7:30pm, the band weaves through the now mostly standing crowd and launches into a fully electrified “Regenerator”, eliminating any thought this might be a more subdued affair. Singer / guitarist Sean McVay jokingly apologizes that the show isn’t going to be the stripped down, intimate set that some of the promotional material had alluded to. “We can at least be intimate!” he quips as he starts strumming the opening riff of “Shadows”. As the 11-minute song builds in intensity, the crowd settles in and begins to let loose, perhaps none more so than an elderly fan at the very front and center of the stage who bobs with exceptional enthusiasm to Scott Donaldson’s tight drumming.
After “Red Star, Pt. 1 & 2”, my buddy aptly compares the epic instrumental sections to sounding like “…the chill version of TOOL…” The band’s unrelenting energy in the small space is sonically impressive, you can quite literally feel Dan Reynolds’ bass lines washing across you like a relaxing bath of sound. I guess the edible is working? In a moment that encapsulates the evening’s odd collision of cultural etiquette - we sincerely enjoy watching a metalhead timidly look around before ever so gently crushing an empty beer can with his boot on the fancy tiled floor.
King Buffalo at David Rubenstein Atrium at Lincoln Center - March 30th, 2023
After a blistering performance of “Filament”, King Buffalo emphatically thanks the crowd and the Lincoln Center before departing the stage. As the room’s lights start to come back on, the crowd almost immediately begins cheering and clapping, hoping for an encore. In what at least feels like a more genuinely unplanned return to the stage than usual, the band thrills one more time with the epic “Cerberus”.
If this show was the Lincoln Center aiming to broaden the range of genres that they feature, King Buffalo proved this experiment to be an exceptional success. Performances of and appreciation for heavy music might typically feel far removed from the high-class artists whom Lincoln Center is most readily associated with, but for at least one glorious night it was a treat to see them standing a little closer.
