Review: THE DILLINGER ESCAPE PLAN - Live in Brisbane

20 Aug

Calculating Finality

Sunday 17th August 2025

Written by Tom Wilson
Photographed by: Rashid AlKamraikhi

“We are Horror. Not “Ho-Ninety-Nine” or any of that shit.” A noxious brew of grimy punk, samples, rap bars and whatever else they feel like throwing into the mix, HO99O9’s performance tonight calls to mind BOB VYLAN’s set on that same stage some months earlier.

Backed by a live drummer – DILLINGER ESCAPE PLAN’s Billy Rymer pulling double-duty on the kit tonight – the New Jersey duo of theOGM and Yeti Bones perform with no guitars onstage, instead using a sampler to pipe in shrieking, grinding slabs of shuddering bass and punk riffage. Within three songs Yeti has jumped into the crowd to run the circle pit, and for a lot of their set, you just don’t know where to look. One of my favourite tracks of this year, Upside Down’s booming guitar is crackling with so much distortion it sounds like the speakers will explode, as Yeti croons through the chaos sounding like DEFTONES’ Chino Moreno. HO99O9 is the sound of the DIY underground, and it feels like a secret language that we’re privileged to know.

Having said goodbye to BOTCH last year, DILLINGER ESCAPE PLAN’s final Brisbane show has a similar bittersweet vibe, as we see off another band that can genuinely consider themselves peerless in their field. They emerge onstage with little fanfare or ego, before they crash into Sugar Coated Sour and the Tivoli detonates. There is a simple rule that permeates all life: if it exists, Ben Weinman will jump off it while playing guitar. He spends more time in the air than on the stage, and the photographers busily snap away, doing their best to capture the chaos. In a neat white button-up shirt that is almost instantly soaked through with sweat, vocalist Dimitri is gripping the mic like he’s trying to strangle someone, and it sounds like he’s stripping the lining from his throat during the spasmodic Clip The Apex … Accept Instruction. HO99O9 emerge onstage with a pair of wry grins as Dimitri announces they’re going to do a mashup, and they bust out a sensational cover of THE PRODIGY’s Breathe, with Yeti Bones doing a note-perfect impression of Maxim.

The berserk Abe the Cop leads into the eerie atmospherics of Weekend Sex Change, as audio samples loop and pile on top of one another, building a sinister soundscape, as the band take a well-deserved breather. During Jim Fear Dimitri defuses a situation between a punter and venue security, who are soon handing out much-needed waters to the pit … and it’s a good thing we’ve rehydrated, because then it’s time for their legendary APHEX TWIN cover, Come to Daddy. There is no encore peekaboo tonight, with Dimitri calmly announcing that this is their last song, before THE DILLINGER ESCAPE PLAN close out their last Brisbane show ever with 43% Burnt. By the end of the song, both Ben and Dimitri have been carried around the venue, and in trying to deliver Ben back to the stage, SENSE loses balance and accidentally hurls him down into the photo pit, where he stops himself inches before losing his teeth on the edge of the stage. Whoopsie. The final jarring riff comes to a close, and instead of racing offstage, the band move forward into the photo pit and immediately start hanging with the fans, Dimitri waving me down to give me a setlist, having recognised me from our Zoom interview months earlier, and I get to apologise to Ben for almost breaking his face. A fantastic night, and a fitting sendoff for a legendary group of artists.