Chemical Brothers trip report - (MDMA)

This was my second time seeing The Chemical Brothers live and they are my favorite electronic dance group to see live. They have enough accessibility and melody to appeal to a rock crowd but maintain enough beats and dirty synths for the dance crowd. I went with my friends D and T up in L.A. When we got there I noticed how beautiful the venue was. It was an open concert venue and lights shot up into the night sky crossing paths. The place was packed and there was a quite a variety of old and young filling up the place. Our seats were fairly high up but center stage which I think I would have preferred then being closer and side stage. We got there midset of Chromeo which was some unimpressive disco synth pop. At about 8:30 we all dropped our MDMA pill and waited for the Chemical Brothers.

They came on within 15 minutes, before the MDMA had really kicked in but the energy of this spectacle was already giving me natural chills somewhat foreshadowing the roll to come. The Chemical Brothers opened up with Galvanize their hit single from a few years back with a series of circular blue visuals containing cross hairs and blinking figures, the song was mainly instrumental except for the chorus of "Don't hold back, world the time has come to galvanize" and the "Time has come to push the button" interlude. I got passed a Joint from some kind neighbors which i smoked for Galvanize and some time later in the evening they again shared another joint with me and my friends. They went directly into Another World next off the New album and they continued with this flowing nature from song to song throughout the night, basically making the whole concert into 2 medley's or sets with an intermission in the middle. The Set list (not in order) was:

Galvanize
Another World
Dissolve
Horse Power
Star Guitar
Setting Sun
Out of Control
Saturate
Believe
Swoon
Hey Boy, Hey Girl
K + D + B
Escape Velocity
Chemical Beats

and possibly 1-2 other songs,

One of the amazing things the Chemical Brothers do live is that they'll mix excerpts from some of their other songs as well, such as the Electronic Battle Weapon 7 where they feature a giant clown on the screen saying "You are all my children now!" right before they go into Believe. These kind of excerpts, twists and turns of the original songs keep the songs fresh and the listener unaware of what's going to happen next instead of some Dj's ive seen that just spin their records. The visuals consisted of silhoutte auras of people walking and going throughout the day, traditional acid house type splotches of colored visuals that would seem to firework off the screen, various bugs, robots, horses, and fractals. There was also a blinking church during Believe which took us through the hall and up through various floors first in black and white and then into color as the music constantly pulled, pushed, dropped , and floored every ounce of my roll the max. There was incredibly quick blinking lights on Horse Powerthat filled the stage and floored me so hard on the MDMA that I could no longer make out the stage or surrounding area and I was lost in the lights, a complete dissolution of surrounding similar to what one might experience on LSD. Lazers occasionally shot from the stage and I reached for them with both hands up in almost a religious induced euphoria, then i would look back and the lazers were reflecting patterns off the trees off the back of the venue venue, quite an amazing effect. The Chemical Brothers alive is an absolute experience for me well beyond the average rave. It's not a set tempo thing and along with the visuals every song takes on a particularly meaning, a chapter if you will to the experience that tells a story through music and visuals as well as book or movie. They closed the set with Chemical Beats and towards the ending they had a blurry 'Love is all' sign that slowly came into the focus as the song was pulsating it's way through with dirty big beat synths.

The highlights of the evening for me was Horse Power Where I completely lost contact with reality, Swoon which is a song from the new album and amazing live and Setting Sun which I was pleasantly surprised they played.

After the show we headed back to T's place and she said she was rolling harder after the show than at it. We did take the MDMA 15 minutes before Chemical Brothers came on and they only played for about 1 hr 20 mins. so I was not surprised she was still peaking. We smoked some weed and D was up for a bit then kind of rolled out on the couch, I gave T a light show and she returned the favor and we chilled and hung out the rest of the night. I took some 2cb at her place which was very interesting with MDMA.

A brief report on the Nexus Flip. The 2cb gave alot of patterning to objects I was watching on an itunes visualizer and I would see the patterns after image come off the computer screen and 'spill' onto the carpet. I was seeing the walls of the house and wood on the floor move around and swirl somewhat. I felt very energetic but at the same time was enjoying laying there watching the various visuals. When T gave me a light show, the light sticks she was using looked extremely bright and like they took on a day glo quality as she swung them around in time with the music creating a colorful display of patterns and energy. My short term memory was Extremely effected, I was kind of having trouble remembering what I was saying alot and where i was going with some thoughts. I did have many interesting thoughts with this new perspective but I felt like I kind of was on a different level than the others. I even got a slight sense of DMT space almost as I'm not sure if I was having a sort of flashback or what but I felt really removed from the room for a few seconds into this space of green lights, but it only lasted a short while.

A great night overall and The Chemical Brothers are a must see for anyone into MDMA and has even a remotely slight interest in Electronic Dance Music. Some footage from the show:



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XBidI62xlj4"]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XBidI62xlj4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SarsV5fpA4g"]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SarsV5fpA4g

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=feYHmmbiMdI"]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=feYHmmbiMdI

 

Man sounds like an awesome night. I can't wait for a good show to come around my way so I can have the perfect mix of set, setting and substance. I only tripped once at a show, on 2c-i and booze (which seemed to dull the 2c-i a lot) and it was terribly hot and sweaty and very physically uncomfortable front and center in the pit. Not really the right sort of music for that either. Still a pretty good time though.

But yeah, I could see myself just losing my mind to a CB set. Good shit, as always.

 

Great report! Ignorant and old here - must learn more about The Chemical Brothers - i bet i'll love them.

i've had DMT effects once on 2CB - that paradoxical trip where i took what was allegedly 25 mgs but it hit me like 75 and there was a blackout, lots of entities (a surprise!) and short term memory difficulties.

Was the 2CB dose level high?

Great report - felt like i was there. Wish the show was longer!

Peace & Love,
Spicey Cat
Purrrr!

 

The 2cb dose was eyeballed, i'm guessing between 25-30 mgs, no way it could been 40 mgs though. I just think the MDMA potentiated it quite a bit which I've found MDMA to do with many drugs, it just softens your mental processing up.

 

I thought you were taking a break? Hahaha.

Nice TR though

 

Awesome! Glad you had a good time. =)

 

I think you have me confused with someone else, I don't recall ever saying I was taking a break recently.

 

That was shermin. Lasted 1 week.

 

Mdma is amazing at concerts. Go to a show with some visual stimulation and some bass and you'll get floored hard. I'm not really a fan of taking rc's or even LSD at edm raves/concerts. They all feel like they weigh me down and a whole analytical aspect to deal with too. I took 2ci at shpongle with 2 friends and they sat in the corner of the club 80% of the night and I only danced fully to one song. Someone here once said people dancing on LSD look like seaweed which I found funny.

I would like to go to a chill spacey concert sometime and try an rc or something though.

 

Just took about 30 mins to watch these videos with the sound routed through our Surround Sound System (great bass). Holy Fuck! That must have been one hell of an intense show!

 

Yah the bass, whole sound setup and production was absolutely amazing. My buddy D has only been to a few shows but he said this far surpassed anything he's been to yet, It gives me chills a little bit playing some of those songs. Definitely a magical evening.