It Was a Fast, Chaotic Night With White Reaper, Taipei Houston and Narrow Head at the Granada

It was a wild night on Wednesday with White Reaper and tourmates Taipei Houston and Narrow Head at Dallas’ Granada Theater.

It all began with an explosive set from San Francisco’s Taipei Houston, which consists of Layne and Myles Ulrich (yes, as in Lars Ulrich), the sons of Metallica’s drummer. The group’s set was fast – so fast that during some of the songs they seemed to have lost their bearings. But what they lost in rhythm they made up for with nonstop energy. There were some points where Myles wasn’t even in his seat while drumming. His playing got aggressive. Layne bantered with the audience, getting everybody to clap along during their last song.

There was a moment where Layne asked a couple of questions, the first being “Do you like loud music?!”, and then “Do you like The Beatles?!”, followed by the most assaulting and chaotic cover of “Eleanor Rigby” ever played.

The lights dimmed for the follow-up act Narrow Head, a Houston shoegaze band formed by vocalist Jacob Duarte in Dallas. The mood shift was palpable as the crowd stopped dancing to sway along to the loud and heavy droning guitars, occasionally breaking out into small mosh pits during their more hardcore tracks.

Duarte switched between soft sentimental vocals and hardcore screaming, keeping the audience on their toes. At long last, White Reaper took the stage, starting off with the title track of their latest album Asking For a Ride.

The dynamic shifted immediately as everyone up front started dancing. This new album is very different from their last, You Deserve Love. They’ve traded their Thin Lizzy-style guitar riffs for a faster, more aggressive Motorhead-meets-Cheap Trick whirlwind, while still keeping Steve Esposito’s power-pop-influenced vocal styling.

A couple of tracks into their set, the crowd stopped headbanging to Hunter Thompson’s ripping guitar solos as Ryan Hater played the opening synth line of “Might Be Right.” In an instant, the entire audience was singing the words back to Esposito.

The party kept rolling as White Reaper brought it back to their 2015 track “I Don’t Think She Cares,” and bodies began slam-dancing to Nick Wilkerson’s hypnotizing drumming.

The group strategically weaved old bangers such as “Sheila” into their set, which consisted mainly of rippers from their latest album. But they closed out the night with a crowd favorite, “Judy French.”

Whether you went as a new fan, or as a longtime listener, their setlist did not disappoint one bit.