Blaze Bayley Live at Bannermans

The Man Who Would Not Die

I’ve been fucking bored of heavy metal these days. I couldn’t even remember what I liked about it. Nothing could pull me out of this depression. Not Manowar’s first Glasgow date in 200 years, not a Priest-Maiden live one-two punch to my ear scrotum, not Joe Elliot performing Animal right at me personally. Shut up, he did. No, the thing that finally restored my faith in the mystical properties of denim & leather was a bald man in his late forties thrusting his beer gut enthusiastically into a half-filled cellar of sweat & beards.

It is a little known fact but Blaze Bayley is the first entity ever to survive solely on a diet of crowd participation. The reason the man takes to the stage every night like his life depends on it, and I have it on very good authority that he does play 365 gigs a year, is that he needs to. He requires a daily dose or he would turn to dust. When there’s no backstage area, it’s hard to make a proper rock star entrance but that couldn’t stop Blaze’s triumphant arrival through a sparse crowd to the opening strains of The Brave. Much talk has been made of the recent line-up changes but no complaints could be lain at the feet of the new guys featuring a young Glenn Benton who’s enthusiastic style gave the impression that he might want to murder the drum kit rather than play it. No, they were tighter than a Dave Vincent PVC number.

Blaze’s inspirational series of lectures on the subject of defiance & rebellion punctuated a set of 15 song about defiance & rebellion. There was also a cautionary tale of Bluetooth bringing about the downfall of man so watch out for that one, kids. Drawing songs from his 5 solo albums, Blaze is not a man to rely on nostalgia. That said, he’s well aware of what his audience are after & 6 Maiden songs leave all but the most die hard of Virtual XI fans sated. Whilst Futureal & Man On The Edge bring the unanimity of the whole audience, it is impressive to see how well the solo material goes down. This is due to the simple yet brilliant choruses of tracks like Kill & Destroy, Ghost In The Machine & of course, the pre-requisite woahohoahs that Maiden have sadly moved on from.

The crowd allows for no break before the encore & the band are back in action seconds later with the outstanding Blood & Belief. Closing with my favourite version of Infinite Dreams, The Clansman never fails to go down well north of the border. It is with a renewed vigour that you leave a Blaze gig, ready to give two fingers to the naysayers, defeatists & critics. I never thought we’d have to do this again but it’s time to dust off the 100 Grimmetts. Clichés be damned, Blaze Bayley is the spirit of heavy metal embodied. Gig of the fucking year.

GWAR. Fucking GWAR

Panic Cell

My nigh-overwhelming feelings of excitement & glee turned to one of horror when I was met on arrival at the venue with news that Panic Cell would not be playing. It was with a heavy heart that I put my Luke Bell Collectible Pint Glass^TM & Luke Bell Collectible Codpiece^TM back in my Luke Bell Collectible Collectible Case^TM & lodged them safely in the cloak-room. Their time will come, Luke. I just know it. [Update : Panic Cell are splitting this weekend so their time won't come. Why, Luke, Why!?]

Clutch

In many ways, Clutch are a perfect distillation of rock today. Straightforward, bass-heavy rock & roll that’s perfect for fucking to (or would be if my advances weren’t rejected by every single member of the opposite sex). It’s just a shame they’ve been adopted by a crowd of checked shirts, trucker caps, fake glasses & self congratulating cuntery. I wouldn’t be surprised if it turned out most of them had bought their beards in Urban Fucking Outfitters. Never before have I wished more for a non-tragic, giant disco ball meet mosh pit accident in my life. Then again, maybe I’m just bitter.

Their back-to-basics approach is so at odds with GWAR’s that it’s hard not to question whether this line-up was put together just to get more heads through the door. Expect to see more of this as the audiences dry up & we struggle to fill the massive venues previous generations foolishly built. The 2012 Slayer & Placebo co-headline tour is already in the works.

Before anyone gets too excited Clutch did what Clutch do best & played some Clutch songs. Highlights, just for a change were 50,000 Unstoppable Watts, Elephant Riders & Neil Fallon’s almost too perfect facial hair. On the plus side, I’m almost certain I saw Tina Turner in the pit. A perfunctory set overshadowed massively by what was to follow.

GWAR

Judging GWAR on musical merit would make about as much sense as evaluating Jeff Becerra’s worth as a performer using his break dancing skills as a metric. That said, they have shown a dramatic improval technically on album so it’s a shame that it’s the muddy, indistinguishable mess they are notorious for that dribbles it’s way through the PA. Recent tracks & classics are pumped out in an indistinguishable noise soufflé but let’s not let that dampen our spirits. In fact, as you might have guessed, a good dampening was the reason most fans had left the house today. Opening to God Save The Queen, our beloved monarch took the stage & was promptly debreasted. As far as entrances go, it’s up there with the Wehrmacht’s trip to Poland in 1939. Although probably with a bit more blood.

A bizarre set-list combined hits with mid-album filler tracks no one has ever requested in the history of the universe. I can only assume it was compiled using a re-purposed National Lottery machine. Get Dale Winton to present it & I’d watch the shit out of it. Anyway, it’s GWAR; an exercise in spectacle. Dead animals are molested, monsters impaled & Lady Gaga gets used as a toilet.  A hurried encore of the ever-infectious Sick of You & the poncho-clad security are finally given the respite they’ve been waiting for. It’s not perfect, it’s probably not even good but none of it matters because there is only one GWAR & the world is going to be a drier, safer, more boring place when they finally hang up their prosthetic phalluses.

Soilent Green

Fuck you, Glasgow. Seriously, blame the promoter, blame the venue. I don’t care but this is Soilent fucking Green & you can’t put together a crowd of 60 people on a Friday fucking night. Fuck you right in your lazy, sagging cunts. Anyway, a couple of overpriced pints later we are stood in front of the stage with enough room to swing a particularly large sack of donkeys just in time for London’s newest musical export.

DripBack

This might only be their third (or so, I lost count) gig but they are certainly no strangers to dingy, deserted venues & the smell of piss. Ex/current members of Ted Maul, Pure Negative, Labrat & Leave the Hall favourites, River Freshney, DripBack‘s brand of manky hardcore deathgrind is about as raw as you can get & leaves a palpable soggy feeling in your Y-fronts. Opener Kick Out Time is a fuckton heavier than the 5 Soilent Green fans attending expect & the blastbeat driven hardcore leaves them looking pretty disconcerted. Blowing through their entire EP, slowing only to dedicate a track to the one & only Nicholas Barker who seems to have been adopted by the Freshney boys as their official mascot/tour manager, their groovy grind & gang vocals get exactly 2 people moving. Short, sharp & very fucking dirty, it’s just a shame there’s no crowd to reciprocate & circle pit covered in handfuls of their own bodily fluids.

Soilent Green

Yes, it’s the band we all came for. All 8 of us. Actually I can count 2 people here just for DripBack so we are down to 6. I could go on for hours about this low turnout being a tragedy equal to that of the deaths of Glenn Rambo & Scott Williams but you’d probably just call me a cunt so let’s move on to the set. Opening with (relatively) new track Mental Acupuncture, the Green waste no time in flooding the venue with sludgey riffs, blastbeats & Falgoust’s distinctive low register barks. Sticking with Inevitable Collapse, the irresistible groove of Blessed in the Arms of Servitude finally sees a flicker of life from the sparse crowd but I’d still have their life-support machines turned off. It is Slapfuck taken from their debut that finally kicks the 6-man pit into action. A solid mix of classics & more recent efforts serves only to highlight their ability to deliver their intricate insanity live as the jarring sludge assault leaves a sweaty mess in the middle of the room. It’s just a fucking shame that, having been away from these shores for 11 years, one of the most influential bands in metal is met with such a wet fart of a crowd. Closer Antioxidant is followed by the kind of apologetic small talk you’d give the bereaved family leaving the funeral of a co-worker you had no feelings towards whatsoever as the band depart the stage & I don’t fucking blame them.

Black Wind, Fire and Steel, respectively.

The Crown and the Bullring

Man… Discovers Fire.
Man… Invents The Wheel.
Man… Builds The Printing Press.
Man… Creates Electricity.
Man… Splits The Atom.
Man… Lands On The Moon.
Man… Owar.

Some moments are destined to ring loud throughout the corridors of eternity, like distant echoes from the very birth of our universe. Some moments are so colossal in magnitude as to spin the entire viewpoint of humanity on its axis, forever altering the fundaments of mankind’s consciousness and forcing long-defined principles of thought to be completely changed. Some moments come to define aeons and provide the fables that will be passed on through the millennia by the songs, poetry and art of our children and the children of a thousand generations to come, the stories of which will give rise to a thousand religions. I can say honestly, without the slightest trace of hyperbole, that Manowar’s triumphant return to Britain after 17 years away is undoubtedly the biggest, most sensational moment in the history of the universe, multiplied by ten.

From the moment we were granted entry into the hall of the Immortals (Birmingham O2 Arena) we knew that this was going to be something quite incredible. Behind a mysterious black cloth of steel cotton supported by the gaffer tape of Isengard stood the drum kit forged from the steel of a thousand small motorbikes. Some speculated that the leftover steel was used to create a single much, much bigger motorbike, but this was never clarified. Thousands of fans poured in to the increasingly sweaty battle dome and marvelled in unison around the merchandise stand at the incredible foresight of Manowar, who had used their mystical powers of clairvoyance to look 20 years into the future at the massive devaluation of the pound and set their prices accordingly. And, lo, the faithful saw that it was good and did payeth £35 for a t-shirt.

A mere one hour and 45 minutes after the doors opened, the mighty Manowar emerged as the backdrop of the Kings was unfurled and dutifully set about preaching the merits of metal with all the subtlety and introverted understatement one might expect at a Nuremberg Rally, eliciting the sort of frenzied response not seen since Hitler’s ‘No Sleep ‘Til Hamburgsmith’ farewell tour of ’45. It was an incredible, heartwarming, life-affirming and uplifting feeling to be a part of a gathering of thousands of fanatical, identically-dressed white men chanting “hail” with their hands saluting proudly in the air. Not that there were any similarities to Nuremburg, of course. Instead of listening to the horrendous deluded ramblings of a mad dictator, here each and every person in attendance was left rapt in the cult of personality as the glorious dictator Joey DiMaio’s jaw-dropping, yet madly deluded and rambling bass solo rang, clicked and squeaked beautifully throughout our ears.

Manowar were, as you have probably read in all the newspapers, here to play through their epoch-making debut album, Battle Hymns, and the occasion was rightly greeted with the sort of religious fervour that theologians had thought only possible should Jesus himself return and offer a limited run of tickets for an intimate Q&A interspersed with readings of his dad’s hit book ‘The Bible’. Each song they played from the album seemed to gather momentum: Manowar gave way to an arousing Death Tone, which grew into a firm Fast Taker before a rock hard, twitching Shell Shock took us to the very brink and… Yes… Yeeeessss… the band and crowd literally climaxed at the greatness of Battle Hymn.

For most humans this would signal the glorious ending to a concert, lifetime or galactic empire. Manowar, however, still had time to fire out another 17 songs, 17 of which featured the words ‘Metal’, ‘Kill’ and ‘Steel’, which was enough to be confirmed as a new Guinness World True Metal Record by an oiled, loincloth-clad Norris McWhirter. The Kings Of Metal literally did not pause for the duration of the gig’s entire 135 minutes of steel, propelled relentlessly by an unquenchable thirst for the gift of true metal and fruity leather waistcoats. Sadly this meant we had to miss the intense power of a Joey DiMaio rant, which left a large number of the fans in attendence at a loss as to what direction to now steer their lives, having grown weary of their epic quest to annihilate the Facebook servers through the unlimited power of Manowarism.

By the time a rousing Hail & Kill and Black Wind, Fire and Steel had been thrust violently into our souls, they finished with a superb closing 10 minutes of Feedback arr. for Guitar & Bass. As Joey presented his snapped bass string to a young pleasure slave with a cheeky thrust of his leather posing pouch, it was clear that tonight he would again have no shortage of help saddling his horse as he drinks his last ale. The mighty Eric Adams again redefined the order of the universe by proclaiming that THEY WILL RETURN, and the warm glory of The Crown & The Ring allowed the exhausted warriors – many emotional and overcome with tears – to leave the hall with honour and pride, particularly one young girl clutching a guitar string who was sobbing something about kissing the ring and now being a slave… Not a wife.

Manowar may never return, but the memory of the night will take its rightful place high atop the mountain of human accomplishment, the sheer legacy of majesty being enough to cement their position as the foremost legends of all music forevermore.

Bonded By Blood & Lazarus A.D.

Bonded By Blood

There’s something highly interesting about mosh pits. From the sweaty sense of homo-erotic comradeship to the primitive establishment of alpha-male status, they are a BBC nature documentary series on evolution waiting to happen. Even without the reassuring gravitas of a David Attenborough narration, the sight of 2 fat men butting against each other like a pair of goats and then repeatedly scuttling away to take another run up is almost hypnotic in its simplistic charm. It would obviously take a musical performance of jaw-dropping charisma and super-tight musicianship to draw attention away from the mesmerising circus freak show festivities in the crowd, and, for the most part, Bonded By Blood duly provide.

Now touring their second album, BBB are in the perfect position to create a set that is wall-to-wall thrashgasm without any filler whatsoever, delivering a nipple blasting set of extraordinarily rapid thrash metal that means I am forced to avert my gaze from the primitive grappling and soak in the fluid solos and savage riffs emanating from the group of seemingly pre-pubescent young boys on stage. Their set was evenly divided between the two albums, though the familiarity of Immortal Life, Feed The Beast and Psychotic Pulse means they are most warmly received by the baying, if a little sparse, crowd. The new material, particularly the awesome Prison Planet and shredful Prototype Death Machine shows that they are evolving their sound (ever so slightly) away from cartoonish new-wave thrash, though they return for a brief encore (can supporting bands do encores?) of the massively childish Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles before departing, safe in the knowledge that, cartoonish or not, they have just pre-emptively shat over Lazarus A.D.

Lazarus A.D.

Hitting the UK for the first time, Lazarus A.D. have found themselves set with an impossible task: try to keep up with the hyperactive Bonded By Blood for 24 dates around Europe. A single set was enough to leave this muscular, athletic (honest) reviewer panting like a Type 2 Diabetic after a waddle from his mobility scooter back to the KFC counter to ask for extra gravy. Unfortunately their latest effort, Black Rivers Flow, sees an increase in both the Southern Groove elements that set The Onslaught apart from it’s peers & a rather disappointing step into far more commercial territory. Anyway, tracks like Absolute Power & Last Breath still sound as fresh as they did in 07 but The Ultimate Sacrifice could have been a Trivium B-Side whilst Light A City could have fallen out of Bullet For My Valentine‘s big bag of mediocrity.

Much like those bands, the problem lies not in their ability but in their insistence to spoon feed us syrupy, mind-numbing choruses that should leave all but the simplest fans wondering how little respect the band have for our cerebral ability. A cynical, jaded mind might propose that Lazarus A.D. have realised the limitations of the thrash scene & set their sights on a far more lucrative market. This theory would certainly be backed up by the proliferation of  dodgy haircuts, Trivium shirts & foetus-faced individuals who’s bemused look suggested this may have been their first time out the womb, let alone first gig. If they want a piece of the commercially viable pie that BFMV, Machine Head & others currently dine on, that’s fine but I’m going to have to ask that they hand back their “Thrash Or Die” motto in exchange for something more suitable. I propose “Thrashin’ For The Cash In”.

Evile Ones

Circle Of Tyrants

The questionable decision of putting Tyrants on 10 minutes after doors open meant that they began their set to an empty room, probably. I wouldn’t know, I was stuck behind a couple of junior Schrödingers who were trying to establish whether thrash was a subgenre of metal or not whilst their bags were searched for Glenns & books on quantum mechanics. Anyway, the second half of their set served as a timely reminder that they need get an album out. To a good majority of the crowd, these tracks are as well known as the headliners & the big sweaty man mess in the middle of room is indicative of their local hero status.

Mutant

Soo-pah-cum-poo-tah! Mutant‘s refusal to put out an album is a subject close to my heart. In fact, if this album doesn’t fly about the room dispensing blow jobs, shooting lasers & making pizza, I’m going to have a wee cry. And possibly a poop. Turbo Hyper Ultra Mega Power & The Rauncher are highlights of a face-melting set. Tighter than Mitch Lurker‘s jeans but nowhere near as atrociously, stab-inducingly shit, Mutant‘s live reputation is well deserved. A headline tour is both an inevitability &, much like a 15 year old girl, a source of way too much arousal to be legal.

Elimination

Amon Amarth want their riffs back.

Evile

Evile‘s meteoric rise to the top of the new thrash pile is nothing short of unprecedented & with that rise has come an unmeetable expectation that they are going to somehow overcome the limitations of heavy metal & reach a stadium filling, mid-ninties Metallica level. This is, of course, retarded. What Evile can do is pen a thrash anthem that’ll rip your balls off & force them violently up your anus. It is this proclivity that probably means we won’t see them selling out Hampden any time soon. It also means I’m not exaggerating when I say that Thrasher is the Toxic Waltz of this generation* &  there’s a very good reason why Ol was chosen as the guy to fill in for Destruction when Mike Sifringer had his hand kicked off.

The set serves to highlight the massive leaps Evile made in songwriting from Enter The Grave to Infected Nations. Whilst First Blood & ETG are very much straight-forward Exodus template plagiarism, A Plague To End All Plagues is the calling card of a technically brilliant, modern thrash outfit combining the old school influences of Puppets-era Metallica with a pioneering vision to carve out a sound of their own in a very stagnant genre. Closing with much missed bassist Mike Alexander’s Killer From The Deep, it’s a clear bookmark to the end of a turbulent, emotional chapter in the book of one of the most exciting bands in the UK at the moment.

* I have, at this point, been compelled by my own brain to remind you that every Black Talon song is the Toxic Waltz of this generation & the fact they weren’t main support on this tour was a gross oversight on the part of the organisers. These are facts.

Credit for the pictures goes to Emy “I’m not going to Leeds” McLeod.

Hot Damn!

Well, it’s now around 3 years since part 1 & people are probably thinking (correctly) that we are a bunch of lazy, amateur hacks with the organisational skills of an inebriated gibbon but here we go with the thrilling conclusion of our two part serial.

Sabbat

Sabbat‘s massively successful UK tour served to remind everyone that they fucking slay & it’s nice to see an appropriate turnout for them. Martin Walkyier forgoes his usual, mildly camp theatrics as they kick things off with A Cautionary Tale. Guitarist Simon Jones is in his usual attire, just one hood short of a gimp suit but Sabbat‘s somewhat questionable dress sense doth belie their collective abilities. One of the more creative bands of the eighties thrash scene, classics Do Dark Horses Dream Of Nightmares & closer, For Those Who Died are every bit as magical now as they were in 89 (probably, fuck knows, I was 4). It is the inclusion of their masterpiece Blood For The Blood God which distinguishes them as one of the bands of the festival for me. You can read this if you want to hear me gushing about it more if you really want.

Earthtone9

Earthtone9

Earthtone9 had the cheek to split up within months of me discovering their massively erotic brilliance & it’s something I never truly forgave them for. Anyway, 9 years on & they’re back to, in their own words, “play a handful of gigs to remind everyone just how good they were”. Well, they can safely consider that job done,  gleefully clubbing Leeds about the face with a solid selection from one of the UK’s most interesting back catalogues. In fact, despite the omission of indisputable classic Amnesia, they left me with all the giddy, post-pubescent joy that I felt back in 02. Tat Twam Asi is as mental & beautiful as ever whilst I Nagual Eye still kicks in the teeth of everyone in the front 3 rows. Their upcoming UK tour is going to be something very special. Oh & there’s a new song. If this doesn’t mean a new album, I’m going to post Karl Middleton a used prophylactic every day for the next decade.

Paradise Lost

Paradise Lost have found themselves in an unenviable position. If HIM were a gateway drug to the church of gothic doom metal, that £10 worth of grass you got off your brother’s dodgy mate & My Dying Bride were a kilo of fine Columbia coke, Paradise Lost would be half a gram of ketamine. Their back catalogue is, for me at least, as hit & miss as chili-induced bowel movement on the East Coast mainline but thankfully live, it’s a different story. Playing a healthy chunk off Shades Of God did a good job of maintaining my Earthtone9 induced chub-on. They tempered this with some more recent material which had a negative effect on the blood flow to my member but at least it prevented me from tomdaring* my jeans. Highlights of a varied set included The Enemy & As I Die before closing on the Eurovision-friendly classic Say Just Words.

Dillinger Escape Plan

First, an admission: On record, Dillinger Escape Plan have only ever left me limp & mildly confused, a bit like that night I took Angela Gossow home, so the prospect of a headlining set from them didn’t exactly fill me with joy. The ensuing set, however, forced me to eat my words in a manner not unlike Ian Watkins when presented with a fully erect phallus. Anyway, they played some songs which were pretty good but hats off to the fuckers, I’ve never seen any band going that mental without sounding like a special kids bus going down a cliff side. Apparently one of their songs is called Gold Teeth On A Bum, and I’m choosing to use the British meaning of the word bum so they get an extra Grimmett just for that. They finished with the one song I actually know, 43% Burnt, I added them to my Best Live Bands On The Planet list & then we went to get very, very drunk. True story.

Now, I know what I’ve done here is give absolutely everyone good reviews & I hate it just as much as you do. It’s a testament to the Damnation team’s skills & taste that they can book such a diverse line-up without picking a few bands that make me want to rip my balls off just so that I have something to plug my ears with. It’s definitely the most fun you can have in England in November without giving one of Motörhead‘s roadies a sloppy hand-job.

* tomdaring is a journalistic term referring to the act of prematurely spaffing one’s trousers whilst attending a live music event

Part One is here if you are half way there & need something to help you finish on.

Sabaton, Alestorm & Thaurorod

However well you get on with someone, there are usually things you’re forever fated to disagree on, and for myself and Leave The Hall’s glorious webmaster, Alestorm are one of them. I think they’re marvellous, he thinks they’re a bad joke who’ve outstayed what little welcome they had, so what exactly was I thinking when I agreed to review them for Leave The Hall? The short answer is that I don’t know, other than it probably involved my usual bloody-mindedness and a desire to piss Ewen off.

Of course it wasn’t just Alestorm on the bill. In fact, they weren’t even headlining; that honour went to Swedish power-metallers Sabaton, a band equally unknown for musical restraint. Combined with openers Thaurorod, this was not a line-up for the faint-hearted.

Thaurorod

Talking of Thaurorod, they kicked off in competent style, although they came across as needing a bit more time to grow into their sound. It all sounded slightly mechanical, lacking that practised ease that enables the bigger power metal bands to play around with their material, but based on this performance, that will come in time. In fact, they were almost the perfect opener – they fitted the line-up nicely, but clearly need the experience of playing to bigger crowds. Much like a terrified young band from Perth I saw open for Turisas once upon a time…

Alestorm

…who, funnily enough, were next on the bill. Alestorm have come a long way, not least on the fear front willy, and are now one of the most entertaining willy live acts around, if not the most willy serious. Debuting a new song called willy Rum, the chorus of which consists entirely of the word willy rum, and introducing their infamous willy Eurovision cover as Wolverhamptons of the Sea made for quite the willy set and got a fitting willy response from an increasingly willy drunk and happy willy crowd, who all but willy drowned lead singer Chris out on the better known willy numbers. The only slight willy surprise was the inclusion of Over The Seas, meaning the rest of the willy set was utterly willy predictable but no less enjoyable willy for that.

Sabaton

Sabaton were, as is to be expected, very much the same vein and opening with The Final Countdown set the tone for what turned out be a lot of fun. Concentrating mostly on their last two albums with some older material before the end, highlights were a cracking rendition of 40:1 that set the crowd alight. I was in the photo pit trying to get a decent shot of lead singer Joakim Brodén (photos that, sadly, were lost when my camera was stolen after the gig) and the atmosphere was electric to say the least. A thoroughly unconvincing early exit was followed by the encore to end all encores, which was a fitting end to an epic night.

* Editor’s Note – Ellie failed to specify what Alestorm’s set was scored out of so I made an executive decision. Also, totally outside my control, some willies may have crept into the Alestorm review.

The Damned United

Damnation? Damn Sexy More Like!

If Damnation Festival were a body part, it would be a penis. A massive throbbing bellend, waved in the face of conventional booking strategies. Firstly, instead of picking up the latest Metal Hammer, pointing at whichever bloated, irrelevant band are on the front cover, shouting “Want that one!” & dribbling a bit, they put together a diverse, genre-spanning line-up of genuinely interesting bands. Then, rather than charging enough to buy a decent sized, semi-detached house, ask for a very reasonable £27 for a day of mind-mangling metal in the centre of Leeds. We’ve not had a better offer than that all year.

Mutant

Mutant

London’s Mutant seems to really enjoy their position so close to exploding onto the metal scene that they’ve not actually bothered blowing up yet. 18 months ago, the hype was palpable as their Laserdrome EP was met with rave reviews, mass hysteria & possibly some sort of parade. Since then, they’ve played up & down the country, supported Evile & thrashed Bloodstock so hard it had bruises for a week. All this momentum carried them in their quest to open the Jägermeister stage & their up-tempo tech-thrash is a perfect boot to the arse of those of us functioning only on near-fatal levels of caffeine & bacon. Shredding, twin guitars lead us inside the Super Computer before engaging in some Psycho Surgery. Frontman Tom’s OTT metal banter fits perfectly with their brand of retro-futuristic noise & their material is unbelievably tight, even with minor sound issues threatening to interfere. It might be too early for the majority of the crowd but Mutant’s high-octane antics set the bar very high leaving all but the most hardy of gashes well & truly thrashed.

Colonel Blast

Skipping Panic Cell just in case they incited any anti-Semitic racism, over on the Terrorizer stage, it’s nice to see Colonel Blast at full strength. New vocalist, Darryl Jones (This Is Turin) immediately sets about making stage his own, stalking it’s breadth like the bastard child of Gollum & Richard O’Brien. Blast beats, chugging guitars, gut wrenching screams propel a schizophrenic & disjointed but never incoherent hardcore/death metal hybrid in it’s quest to wreck necks & soil underwear. On the epic For The Greater Good they generate a wall of sound that would have Phil Spector wanking into an exit wound for days. Even a knee injury doesn’t stop them as guitarist Ben Whitfield plays the best part of the last track on his back.

We’ve got a lot to thank Sheffield for. A failed steel industry, Bring Me The Horizon & now Rolo Tomassi who sound like that elusive Final Fantasy 7 remix album At The Drive In never got round to releasing. Singer, Eva Spence exudes sexuality like a particularly filthy librarian at the Christmas party. Unfortunately for me, the rest of the band secrete levels of hip that leave me feeling physically unwell. They are far too slender, attractive & fashionably haired for my constitution, having about the same effect as reading whole issues of NME & VICE back to back.

Bonesaw

Luckily there was something far less stomach churning stirring over at the Terrorizer stage. Aberdeen’s Autopsy loving Autopsy fans, Bonesaw who, if you can’t tell, are somewhat enamoured with the band Autopsy. If they were to play death metal any more old school, it would be wearing one of Chuck Schuldiner’s nappies. They also successfully kicked off the first pits of the day unless Panic Cell sparked some sort of Jäger fuelled hoe-down but luckily we missed out on that so we’ll never know. Anyway Bonesaw’s murky, punky sound might not be big nor clever & it’s certainly nothing new but they prove that Aberdeen has the monopoly on morbid-as-fuck death metal riffage.

Lawnmower Deth

Flying Killer Cobs from the Planet Bob

Lawnmower Deth are almost certainly my favourite garden implement fatality based band. This is partly because Trowel Murder are fucking shit (not really, I made them up) but mainly due to the fact that I can’t imagine another band that could have a man dressed as King Diamond in a poncho crowd surfing & a man dressed as Satan bouncing on a trampoline without coming across as a cack-peddling novelty act. Steering clear of the contractually obliged audio abortion Billy, they stick to the crossover thrash genius of Ooh Crikey. It might be dumber than a room full of goregrind fans discussing their favourite method to fuck a stabwound but it’s a genuinely hilarious set as they blast through Flying Killer Cobs from the Planet Bob, Sheep Dip & Satan’s Trampoline. Complete nonsense of the most enjoyable variety, just a shame I had to stay (relatively) sober & wasn’t face down in a puddle of my own sick by the end.

Well, that’s enough for part 1. You’ve probably all got day jobs to get back to & I’m off for a wank & a cry. Check back soon(ish) for Part 2 featuring SSS, Sabbat, Paradise Lost, Earthtone9 & Dillinger Escape Plan.

Fozzy

Falter Bridge

I’ll begin with a disclaimer. This review is packed so full of late nineties wrestling references that those of you who foolishly abstained from watching oiled, steroided superhumans engaging in protracted gay-offs would probably be best just skipping the whole thing & enjoying the shiny pictures.

Chris Jericho is the world’s 4th grand slam champion, a masterful, girl-punching heel & he once pooped himself on a place in Mexico. Unfortunately for all involved, Fozzy’s set could only reasonably compare with one of those sparkling accolades. Around himself, he has recruited a musical nWo of low to mid-carders elevated above their station by Jericho’s, or Mongoose McQueen as he prefers to be known on stage, mere involvement. Recruiting almost entirely from nineties metal stalwarts Stuck Mojo, it’s at least a relief that they didn’t attempt to rehash their Southern rap sound. This is most likely due to the fact that Jericho is well aware that he could never top Macho Man Randy Savage’s 2003 wrestler to rapper transition. No, thankfully they stick to a straight forward American hard rock template.

Blasting through fan favourites Martyr No More, Crucify Yourself & Enemy only serve to highlight Rich Ward & Rick Beato’s respective production skills. Jericho’s live voice is the sonic equivalent of a David Arquette WCW Heavyweight title reign & the Y2J chants between every song are proof, as if it were needed, that the 200 strong crowd are here for his wrestling ability more than his song writing. In response, we get the same tired stage banter he’s been rolling out all tour. He really should have cut a blinding promo about how the people of Edinburgh are brain-dead hicks who don’t deserve his presence before putting one of the front row in a Walls of Jericho. That would have been more enjoyable.

Paraskavedekatriaphobia, apparently about Jericho’s fear of looking more like Gordon Ramsay every day, was the climax of the set allowing Ward a chance to pull out his best budget Zakk Wylde impressions as the tempo does a lot to hide the straining vocals. Unfortunately we don’t get their 14 minute prog-epic, Wormwood which is definitely the best thing they’ve ever done.

Finishing, as always, with a cover of Freewheel Burning so badly mangled that even Priest won’t want it back, one thing is for sure. Fozzy’s albums have shown a linear improvement elevating them above the status of novelty. Their live show is a different story. I blame Vince Russo. It’s almost certainly his fault. Then again, if this stops Suck Mojo putting out another fucking album, all I can say is “Go Fozzy, Go Go!”

Skeletonwitch

Angelus Apatrida

Staring out the window of KFC into the neon lights of downtown Glasgow in the rain, you’d be fooled into thinking you were watching Blade Runner. A shit Blade Runner filmed in a city crushed by the iron fist of Thatcher on a budget of £50 & a multipack of Marathon bars. Anyway, our fried chicken-based pitstop resulted in our missing openers Psychoanalysis. Arriving just in time for Angelus Apatrida, Latin for Rather Decent Spanish Thrash Band I’d Never Heard Of, they launch into a full pace, balls out thrashgasm in the vein of Kreator & Exodus. The Glaswegian crowd did their part for international relations by ending their set to a rapturous chant of “Gracias”.

Warbringer

I was quite looking forward to Warbringer, despite finding them a fairly unengaging proposition on the times I have seen them before, I was sure that their potential on disc had to cross over and tickle reality at some point. Maybe it was the confines of the cosy venue or the effect of the crowd rabidly hoovering up everything that they dangled forth like a coked-up Ian Watkins fluffing for ‘Bukkake Onslaught 6 – This Time It’s Personal’ (allegedly) but they majorly dominated my face. Unleashing the first 3 tracks from Waking Into Nightmares in order and increasing the thrash factor by a factor of 10 on each one was not a bad way to get things underway, the small but passionate posse of ‘bangers thoroughly losing their minds for a band that are strangely the mainstream media darlings of the new thrash scene. Their set was as good as they could possibly extract from their 2 and a bit releases, with Total War and Shoot To Kill ripping all and sundry like a large nailbomb in a small orphanage.

It was an excellent performance, Warbringer narrowly missing the hallowed 5 Grimmett accolade only due to their being bizarrely Rick Rolled by the crowd. Baloff would have unleashed the Helicopter Trout for that act of poserism. However, he would have already penalised 56,000 Grimmetts for their obliviously forming under the name Onslaught in 2004. They should be more careful and original when naming themselves, like I was when creating my 2 new thrash bands Metallica and Slayer.

Anyway,

Skeletonwitch

Skeletonwitch are the Rambo 4 of music. Taking the cheesy genius of the 80s & the cold, evil aggression of the 90s to create a single, perfect logical conclusion of muscles, gore & burning Vietnamese children. Much like Rambo 4, I spent the majority of their set short of breath & heavy on liquids in my underwear. Kicking things off with Submit To The Suffering, the entire set sided towards their latest LP Breathing The Fire, which is a shame as the very slightly superior Beyond The Permafrost is my preferred dose of skeletal witchery.

Highlight of the night, thrash anthem Stand, Fight & Die builds to a none-more-metal chant of “You Stand, You Fight, You Die!”. Despoiler of Human Live & Crushed Beyond Dust might not be the most progressive tracks in their canon  but it’s a week on & my neck is still testament to their destructive power, i.e., it is fucked.

Seeing as their average song runs to 3 minutes 3.843243243243246 seconds (I didn’t even have to normalise for outliers with that one), they managed to blast through a decent collection of tracks in their hour-long set. I was worried that with any more Skeletonwitch, my brain would do an Bobby Blitz & explode as a result of a massive thrashgasm/stroke. By the time they closed with Within My Blood, the majority of the crowd were on stage with them, much to the venue staff’s dismay. Returning for an encore of Baptized In Flames, waves of bodies suicide-dived face first back onto the concrete like an army of denim clad lemmings. It was a thing of beauty.

Nate Garnette might look like a lovable ginger Santa but put a Flying V in that man’s hands & he’ll riff your face off as he attempts to keep up with Scotty Hendrick’s insane, Hank Shermann-esque solos. Frontman Chance Garnette’s inimitable vocals grab your attention like an angry Norse god attempting to rape you in the ear with his massive noise-penis. Skeletonwitch are rightly considered leaders of the new thrash pack as they push the limits of the old templates but whilst their albums are great, live is where the dominate.

Sabbat

Achren

I was unaware that International Talk Like A Pirate Day had come around again (not really, you dullard) until Achren’s set. “You are a sorry excuse for a crowd compared with Bloodstock!” barks vocalist Scott, in his best buccaneer tones, to which he receives the sage response, “It’s the same fucking crowd, ya baw!” It’s true, looking around Ivory Blacks, about half of the crowd were packed into the New Blood tent on Saturday morning. It is also true that the crowd were a good deal less enthusiastic but that might have something to do with post-festival malaise.

None of this stops Achren blasting through the Immolation-esque Forgotten King & the crushing The Way of the Twilight or the Aura of Flies. For all their sound & fury though, it seems the crowd aren’t the only ones feeling rough. Closing with the undeniably catchy Bastards (On the Gallows or Bastards on the Rack), there is a consensus between crowd & band that we’ll call this one a draw & come back next time with a bit more energy.

Sabbat

Last time Sabbat played in Scotland I was shitting in my own pants and drinking sweet, sweet boob milk. Last night they returned following their reunion and very little had changed, only this time I simultaneously shat and jizzed myself, and my mum no longer allows me to suck her milkers. If anything, Sabbat have changed even less, still able to thrash to within an inch of their lives – thrashing almost too far given Martin Walkyier was nursing a bad throat which, according to the man himself, was brought on by the rigours of touring in a minibus in your 40’s.

Luckily for the assembled fanatics – some of whom had been waiting for 20 years to see them – medical problems and any advancing years were brushed aside by a face full of ball melting, warp-speed riffs. Proceedings began with a savage rendition of The Clerical Conspiracy but the crowd seemed slow, sluggish and a little subdued, which had me thinking we were in for another cringe worthy Scottish date where people are seemingly only in a gig to get out of the rain, having no desire to actually hear any music, which is something I have witnessed in this very venue on many occasions. Maybe it was just that everyone was in a state of shellshock or had possibly joined me in massively soiling myself as when Behind the Crooked Cross began, people were thrashing as if possessed by the ghost of Baloff himself and my fears of a damp squib were quickly allayed.

Seeing as Sabbat have only 2 ‘proper’ albums to draw upon meant that almost everyone got to hear their favourite song, the set drawing evenly from History of a Time to Come and Dreamweaver, and duly The Best Of Enemies, I For An Eye, Blood For The Blood God, The Church Bizarre and an almighty Do Dark Horses Dream of Nightmares? blasted the crowd into sweaty submission. By the time the band returned for an encore, Walkyier’s urging people to rub their bodies together to create the necessary heat for a Wildfire was as plausible as it was fruity and when they ended with the giant hooks of For Those Who Died, it was a fitting memorial for the ‘bangers that had foolishly, yet amusingly, stage dived straight onto the unforgiving concrete.

The gods may not have wanted this gig to happen; Sabbat’s tour with Shart Enemy being cancelled due to volcanic activity, vocal health issues and the fact that they had to play with only one support act, but they delivered something that was well and truly worth the effort. Now they just need to make sure they don’t leave it another 2 fucking decades to come back or next time I’ll be shitting in my pants with old age.

Die Apokalyptischen Reiter

Reitermania Finally Hits Britain

It is 15 years since the criminally underrated Die Apokalyptischen Reiter formed & it’s only now that they get a UK headlining tour. Making up for lost time, the German nutcases decided to blast through a set which leaned heavily towards to last 2 albums. I can’t help but feel that the show would have benefited from a couple more of their classics. Licked By The Tounges Of Pride, Reitermania & Unter Der Asche almost made up for the absence of anything from their 2004 masterpiece, Samurai.

Reiter are used to playing to much larger crowds at home than over here but that didn’t stop them bringing the sex swing, inflatable boats & flaming torches, causing much anxiety to the poor roadies as flames licked the wall-mounted bass drum. Their exacting requirements caused the venue to have to set up a second sound desk which paid off with the end result being the sonic equivalent of a blow job on a summer’s day.

Minor complaints about the setlist don’t mar a thoroughly enjoyable gig & although Die Apokalyptischen Reiter are far more suited to a large field in Germany in early August, they handle themselves admirably on a club tour.  It is encouraging to see a genuinely unique band getting a crack at the UK without having to support fucking Trivium.

Wolf & Cauldron

Cauldron Conjure The Fucking Mass On A Cold Monday In Glasgow

Yesterday was a sad day for the Scottish metal scene. I know it was a Monday night, I know that somewhere down the line posters were printed with the wrong date on, I know there are a ton of metal gigs on this month but I still think that there should be a turn out of more than 50 people when bands of Wolf/Cauldron’s calibre actually bother to do a Scottish date. All I hear is bitching and complaining that no bands play Scotland and then whenever someone puts on a gig that’s not Slayer/Machine Head/Lamb of God, no one fucking turns up. Anyway, that’s my rant over, on to the review.

Facegrinder –

Proceedings were opened by local death metallers, Facegrinder. I’ve seen them before supporting Onslaught and know they are much better than last nights performance indicated. Their whole set went all kinds of wrong. They took to the stage missing their bassist, the lead guitarist’s mum had just been chucked out by an over-zealous bouncer, the sound was muddier than an Indonesian village during the rainy season & their singer looked to be suffering from the hangover from hell. They get a Grimmett for turning up & one because in the middle of the set, their singer wandered off to the bar and bought himself another pint.

Cauldron –

The gig properly began when Canada’s finest NWOBHM (no irony intended or needed) revivalists, Cauldron stormed the stage. Cauldron’s particular brand of heavy metal hails from the days when core was something you found in an apple, fringes were cut using a spirit level & tight jeans were accompanied by high tops, not Converse. The size of the crowd, combined with his untamed vocal delivery meant that Jason Decay’s microphone was almost completely unnecessary. Cauldron are the complete package: catchy, heavy riffing, perfectly timed Priest-esque synchronised head banging, solos performed at a 90° angle balanced on top of the monitor. All this is carried out without effects, without swapping guitars & done with such confidence that you wouldn’t believe they’ve only been going 3 years. The set might have only clocked in at 40 minutes but by the end of it, they own the place & there’s not a single person in the crowd that isn’t erupting with NWOBHM jizz.

Wolf –

Wolf were given a hard task to follow but from the opener, Speed On from the excellent Ravenous album until the closer, In The Shadow of Steel, they showed they weren’t going down without a fight. Despite never quite connecting with the crowd in the same way Cauldron did, the set-list was perfect & they were tighter than a Nun’s cunt. Highlights included Curse You Salem, Hail Caesar & discovering that Lee Dorian’s Swedish twin brother sings for Wolf.

All in all, it was an excellent night that underscored the massive problem with Scottish metal fans & their general unwillingness to attend anything that doesn’t feature Trivium. It’s the latest in a long line of well promoted, poorly attended gigs & it’s no fucking wonder that promoters aren’t willing to risk putting on smaller gigs. Next time I hear a complaint that no good bands play Scotland from someone that won’t support their scene by attending a couple of events a year, I’m gonna rip their fucking throat out, shit down their wind pipe and let a tramp rape the turd-stained esophagus.