First up are Awake by Design, a Classic/gothy
rock band with overly long songs and not that
much imagination in the songs either, the musicianship
ain't bad, intact it's pretty damn good, but it's
all rather predictable, and not that heavy, the
solos feel uninspired the singer while he can
sing he ain't no Bruce Dickinson or Blaze Bailey
which he might be aiming for. There's a fair few
guys and gal on stage but there doesn't seem to
be that much to watch, and I think they've seen
too many rock videos where the guitarists group
together done too often and not exciting enough
when they do it as the songs don't lend themselves
kindly to it. Just too much excess and no enough
decent heavy riffs!
Next up are Pain of Salvation a Swedish metal
band, and they do rock your socks, the singer
has a whole Mick Jagger/Jim Morrison thing going
on, his vocals aint too bad can carry a tune,
the riffs are nice and heavy catchy too and tons
of melody in the non so heavy parts, for some
reason and thankfully no stink lines, there not
wearing any shoes, all of them are rocking the
boards barefoot,weird really, not sure of the
songs they played but i liked what I heard from
these guys, glad one of the guitarists played
up to the camera, they also got the crowd involved
to which is always cool, overall there a solid
rock band and i hope to see them again soon, as
they've gained another fan from tonight
Apocalyptica are a band ive been waiting to see
properly for quite a while now, after being mercilessly
pulled away at sonisphere this year by our editor
Trigger and ya know the offer of beer, as you
do, any way less waffle. First 3 songs are all
instrumental and metal as fuck which peaks on
the 4th with master of puppets and I and most
of the crowd sing the lyrics to this alternative
but just as heavy take on this thrash classic,
5th song is with vocals which is called end of
me which is followed by I'm not Jesus he's not
quite Corey Taylor but still pretty fucking awesome,
refuse/resist another heavy cover tie great and
got me some more head banging done. Another 2
new songs from 7th symphony first up is beautful
and is very melodic and classical, jus taking
it down a few notches, a bit of a breather you
could say and it every bit beautiful as the title
suggests, sacra continues in the same vein only
much darker and sadder, other instrumental songs
include, bittersweet and Last hope before the
vocalist came out for bring them to light, which
is fast and heavy as hell, A real head banger,
seek and destroy gets the crowd going suitably
wild again, and they round offend main set with
inquisition symphony another really heavy song
tons of bass to really feel the music. They open
there encore with Gates of Manala which is a fairly
long and heavy song , could have been shorter
but you can live with that. Inform care follows
which and the show is then closed by the hall
of the mountain king, bloody awesome as I like
the original piece and most covers Ive heard are
excellent and this is no exception! Brilliant!!
Awake By Design 2/5
Pain Of Salvation 4/5
Apocalyptica 5/5
Review By Robert Lawrence |
