Gig Review

Evile
Elimination, Mutant
Nottingham, Rock City Basement
12th February 2011

                                                                                          
Evile                                Elimination              Mutant
              

Mutant hit the stage and tear through a neck breaking thrash set with extreme force. Very powerful music with a lot of stop and starts so that when you think it’s safe to take a break and let your guard down it kicks back in and rushes through your face. One thing I must say is I think they are the least original band of the night because for some parts sound quite generic but somehow they manage to not be completely generic by including some truly great hooks and riffs with a lot of delay on the vocals. Its more of a party atmosphere than a massive brutal metal gig which is a nice change for once. Surprisingly the room by the point of mutant playing is majority full which for a support band to come on to is a very good thing.

Elimination are a pure thrash metal infused with battle and power metal elements. Much more distinctive sound than Mutant. They have a lot more energy on stage and they have a much larger stage presence. However having all this should be a lot more exciting than the previous band yet the crowd reaction to them as opposed to mutant is much lower than I expected. Maybe for a thrash crowd they were a bit different however I thought it was much better to have this kind of variety on a night that could have been 3 bands sounding exactly the same. In their last song half way through they slip in the riff from Judas Priest classic “Breaking the Law” which picks up the crowd reaction a bit but not by much. Either way I thoroughly enjoyed Elimination and think they played a damn good set.

Evile bring my fears of a thrash gig without a single mosh pit to an end; as soon as they stride onto the stage and blast through “First Blood” it opens up and the face smashing begins. The thing with Evile is unlike a lot of band including thrash bands you don’t need to know the songs fully to bang your head to them as they don’t have many sudden tempo or style changes they ease into them instead so you can pick them up. The only noticeable glitch in the performance is the very uncomfortable silence between songs due to excessive water intake by Matt Drake yet when not inhaling water he is a very funny confident front man. The set encompasses an equal balance of song between both albums including some Infected Nations songs rarely and never played live “Plague to end all Plagues”, “Metamorphosis” “My Parasite” as well as the title track “Infected Nations”. Evile want everyone to know even though their second album was very experimental that they are not going to lose their way with the taster from the new album, the song “Bitch” from the upcoming third album; there are no vocals for the song which make it entertaining to listen to Matt sing a lot of random “Something and something again!” and Ol Drake not knowing one section of the guitar parts and mess about making for some good entertainment; very funny to witness but the music is damn fast and heavy showing just where the band are heading with the new album. The classics from “Enter the Grave” are the tracks that really destroy the venue and cause the blood to shed, “Thrasher”, “We Who are About to Die”, neck cracking “Enter the Grave” and their encore “Killer From The Deep” noted for being written by the late great Michael Alexander. Glorious end to a mental thrash gig that left me feeling deeply satisfied.

Mutant – 3/5
Elimination -4/5
Evile - 5/5


Review By James Webb

 Evile


Matt Drake
Ol Drake
Ben Carter
Joel Graham

 Elimination


Darrell Abbott
David Spicer
Justin Smith
Neil Stevens
William Rowsell

 Pierce The Veil


Tom
Josh
Sam
Jon

 Band Related Links
Evile Myspace
Elimination Myspace
Mutant Myspace
 Review Score Code
- Top Cheese
- Brilliant
- Pretty damn good
- Ok I guess
- What Was That?