It was a night for those closest to the group as This Will Destroy You took to the stage at Austin’s 29th Street Ballroom.
Intimate moments like these are reserved for special occasions, and that certainly was the case on this hot summer night.
The unique outfit, originating a short drive south in San Marcos, produces sweeping music which is an appropriate fit for an Oscar-winning film as much as it belongs at your local all-ages art space.
This night, staying true to the promise of their live performances, the group sent tremors through the audience as their instrumental guitar music combined a mix of clean, echoing tones with a deafening wall of sound offered during the zenith of their pieces.
But, the guitar swells of this genre-driving group were just a little different than previous nights during their summer run of shows.
The July 29 performance, attended by parents and loved ones, marked the return of founding member Raymond Brown, who joined the touring band to perform some of the group’s classic compositions that he helped pen.
Brown, the band’s bass player and keyboardist, left the group in early 2008 and is now a physician practicing in Austin. With him back on stage, the group swept through the songs that make up Young Mountain, the group’s genre-defining debut, released, in its original form, two decades earlier.
As the sun began to set on neon lights that have come to typify the city and This Will Destroy You played through the now iconic compositions, fellow co-founder Jeremy Galindo expressed gratitude for the audience’s continued support for This Will Destroy You over the past 20 years.
Galindo’s message was brief: If there is an audience that still wants to listen, he and his bandmates are more than happy to oblige.
This reflection was only the beginning of the evening as the band seamlessly transitioned from the past to the present, performing songs from their new project, You, Infinite.
The new undertaking, primarily composed by Brown and Galindo and backed by the rest of This Will Destroy You’s lineup, marks the continued evolution of the group’s sound with the addition of some new electronic sounds. This new project remains true to form and continues to offer pensive refrains and ground-shaking climaxes that have come to move audiences both emotionally and physically at This Will Destroy You shows.
The audience offered calls of encouragement and praise as the group played through selections from You, Infinite’s self-titled debut released earlier in the year.
“Raymond and I pretty much got started together,” Galindo told Premier Guitar, before performing at The Basement East in Nashville earlier in the tour.
“We kind of picked up where we left off. We have very similar sensibilities in how we like to approach things. It [You, Infinite] felt like a spiritual successor to where we left off.”
The group played through a significant portion of You, Infinite’s self-titled album, released earlier this year, before Brown departed the stage for This Will Destroy You to complete the remainder of the set.
This new work follows a 2024 decision by Galindo and fellow founding member Christopher Royal King to officially part ways with no intention of releasing any new This Will Destroy You material in the future.
Galindo and King have performed as This Will Destroy with two distinct lineups of musicians, and the formal announcement did not come as a shock to dedicated fans.
Following the precedent set by the group’s original lineup, Galindo’s version of the group bathed the audience in reverberated guitars and crushing, distortion-drenched crescendos during the recent Austin show.
The audience remained peaceful and still, an attestation to the group’s ability to wrap the listener in a duvet of swirling textures.
It was a good night for all.
