The Taste Of Chaos tour is an annual rock tour
that started off back in 2005 and has been classed
as the winter and heavier version of the Warped
tour and the good thing about the tour is that
it branches away from America and also tours all
over Europe, when the tour first took place in
2005 it had a massive line up of The Used, Story
Of The Year, Killswitch Engage, Rise Against,
Funeral For A Friend and also played massive venues
such as Brixton Academy and Birmingham Nia, now
the tour is on its fifth anniversary it seems
to be a bit more low scale playing the smaller
Academy sized venues in the UK and only having
4 bands on the bill which happened to be Maylene
And The Son Of Disaster, Every Time I Die, In
Flames and Killswitch Engage, could this be down
to the credit crunch or could it be down to the
fact that the Taste Of Chaos tour has already
ran out of steam?
So we got into the Academy slightly late missing
the first band Maylene And The Son Of Disaster
who were on pretty much as soon as the door’s
opened, however we got inside the venue minutes
before Every Time I Die took to the stage and
I have to say it was very interesting watching
them play.
 The Academy in Bristol is one of the smallest
Academy venues around and the stage is also so
small and due to the amount of bands playing tonight
a lot of equipment was needed so when Every Time
I Die took to the stage they were so far forward
that they were nearly stood in with the crowd
as the stage was packed behind them with In Flames
and Killswitch Engage’s equipment, however
this didn’t stop Every Time I Die from rocking
out as they played an energetic set with front
man Keith Buckley running around as much as he
could, dodging the drum kit and other obstacles
on stage whilst screaming his lungs out, his fellow
band mates were loving every minute of the set
especially their current touring drummer Ryan
Leger. Every Time I Die a good 30 minute set which
featured a mixture of songs old and new such as
‘Bored Stiff’, ‘Floater’
and ‘Wanderlust’, the only thing that
stood in the way of them having an truly amazing
set was the lack of room they had on stage which
obviously effected their hectic ways slightly.
 Next up was the Swedish metal five piece who
finally returned to the UK after cancelling their
UK tour with the Cancer Bats earlier in the year,
the set up for In Flames was much better than
Every Time I Go as more equipment was moved off
the stage to make way for In Flames, chants of
“In Flames” welcomed the band on to
the stage tonight and they blasted off straight
into a massive jamming session with a mad flutter
of strobe lighting , the crowd got well into the
music of In Flames from the start with people
jumping about and singing along. Frontman Anders
Friden did extremely well with his wide range
of vocals coming across even better live than
they do on record, guitarists Bjorn and Jesper
spent the set knocking out thunderous guitar riffs
whilst swapping the side of the stage they were
stood on throughout. Anders spent a lot of time
interacting with the crowd and also inviting a
young member of the crowd to come up on stage
and film one of the songs with his compact camera
with Anders urging him to upload the video to
You Tube when he gets home. In Flames played a
blistering set which included songs such as ‘Leeches’,
‘Trigger’, ‘Pinball Map’
and the fantastic ‘Take This Life’
which got the crowd excited. Every time In Flames
finished a song there was more chants of “In
Flames”, this had me wondering if the majority
of the crowd were here to see In Flames rather
than Killswitch Engage.
 It was a 30minute wait for Killswitch Engage
to take to the stage, that time quickly came around,
the lights in the Academy dipped and circus style
music played as the members of Killswitch Engage
took to the stage where their latest piece of
merchandise t-shirt which happened to be a white
t-shirt with a print to make it look like a tuxedo,
guitarist Adam Dutkiewicz was as crazy as ever,
wearing the same as all the other band members
but in addition he had a black scarf wrapped around
his head and a Killswitch Engage superman style
cape, the stage show that Killswitch Engage had
was pretty basic with 5 men basically having a
good time with a massive set of screens behind
them on stage displaying their name and various
different shapes and colours whilst they played.
Frontman Howard Jones had a smile on his face
from start to finish and the majority of the time
didn’t need to sing the more melodic parts
of songs as the crowd were perfectly singing the
songs word for word perfect, Adam Dutkiewicz spent
the majority of the show running back and forth
like a mental case playing his guitar and on the
odd occasion that he spoke to the crowd he came
out with the randomist of things like he always
does.
 The crowd for Killswitch Engage was very energetic
with people moshing for the whole set, Adam also
called for the crowd to do the wall off death
which went down really well with the crowd being
split into two sides and then being forced to
charge at each other, towards the end of the set
it was crowd surfing central with 3 or 4 people
going crowd surfing at any one time which kept
the security busy but from where I was standing
they appeared to be a little too heavy handed
on the crowd surfers.
Killswitch Engage played a wide number of old
and new songs but the highlights for myself was
when they played ‘My Last Serenade’
and the closing track which was a cover of ‘Eye
Of A Tiger’.
All in all it was a very eventful night, I feel
Every Time I Die drew the short straw having to
play with a major lack of room, In Flames played
a blistering set like they were headlining and
Killswitch Engage just blew me away with their
sheer energy and positive vibe.
Every Time I Die 3/5
In Flames 5/5
Killswitch Engage 5/5
Review By Trigger |
