You have to admire Fu Manchu, through 12 studio albums and over 20 years of playing together in the current line up they have not deviated from their plan. They clearly love what they do and are not going to change it for anybody. You could put any Fu Manchu song from any album on any other album and it would fit right in. They have their sound and they have stuck with it, to be honest, if you had created the awesome fuzz distortion that Fu Manchu have then you wouldn't change it either.
As a live band Fu Manchu's songs and sound stand up well, the fuzz distortion translates well live and so do Scott Hills distinctive vocals. In fact their songs, which have always been well written, benefited a lot of from the extra energy they put into their live performance. Certainly the crowd got into it, and for a stoner rock gig there was a pretty big mosh pit right in front of the stage. The tour was ostensibly to promote their excellent new record Clone of the Universe which led to the only negative of the evening when they played the 18-minute monster song il Mostro Atomico. Don't get me wrong, this is by no means a bad song, its a stoner rock symphony that wouldn't have shamed Shostakovich with its three movements and recurring central theme, but it meant in the time taken we could have had 4-5 more classic Fu Manchu tracks, particularly off of some of the albums they ignored.
However, that being said when your only complaint about a gig is that they didn't play more songs you can be pretty confident that you had a good nights entertainment. Fu Manchu's combination of songs, energy and sound make them a live band you should see if you have any interest in stoner rock at all. 4.5/5
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