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2015-03-28 DE – Oberhausen - Turbinenhalle |
VNV Nation - Project Pitchfork - Laibach - Leæther Strip - Grendel - Spetsnaz - Vomito Negro - Centhron A band that appealed especially to the younger crowd and brought them to dance was :: CENTHRON :: from Bremen. Elmer (vocals), Mark (bass) and Annette (Synth) presented songs from the last decade of their work and also from their sixth album Biest, released in November. Why the three musicians categorize themselves into the genre Viking Harsh Electro was recognizable when you saw the male members taking the stage with long hair, army clothes and the rather unusual bass, plus extensive head banging. As a visual characteristic, this show is unique and impressing. After the first sounds it was clear that especially younger visitors would use the hard, aggressive beats to exploit the spotlights of the otherwise rather poor light in order to start off the festival with excessive cyber-dance moves in the auditorium. "We are Centhron, raise your fist" was the battle cry and as an opener, the three North Germans made people sing along especially with songs like Porn Queen and animated them to extensively swing their arms and hips. Despite all that, the boring light work and the rather repetitive sound got stale after a few songs and remained only interesting for hard-core fans of the genre Aggrotech until the end. Nevertheless, this was a charismatic, motivating opener.
For more than thirty years in the business, it was now up to mastermind Gin Devo with electronic drummer Sven Kadanza and live keyboarder Richard Guillaume to shake the audience with Old-school Electro and EBM. After an almost too long intro, the Belgians succeeded quickly in making the first rows move and surge. This was summarized well by the almost surprised expression "I see a lot of people here!", because there were already many people, surprisingly, in front of the main stage in the early afternoon. In contrast to the previous musicians, :: VOMITO NEGRO :: rather served a more mature generation of electronic listeners now. On stage the movements of the singer were as reserved as the light operations but new songs like Obsession from the new album Death Sun as well as older ones like No Hope, No Fear brought more people in front of the stage. Black Power made the fans to sing along again but despite of that, hits and more standard songs took turns and the band kept the last spark for itself. VOMITO NEGRO delivered solid and good old-school Electro, vehemently defending itself against cyber techno and its subspecies. Unfortunately this was rather an interlude on the way to the next band.
:: SPETSNAZ :: are representative for the new wave of EBM. The stage remained minimalistic as usual with a small kit for PC and e-drum, on which Stefan Nilsson operated with a lot of fun and also enjoyed having contact to the audience. Singer Pontus Stålberg ran from one side of the stage to the other, interacted with the audience and cheered at them. After Stefan opened his shirt and gave himself a water shower to Perfect Body, the last restraint in the audience vanished and the Devil's Horns originating from the metal scene as well as a brutal mosh-pit developed in front of the stage. For fans and band it would have been nicer if such a charismatic band was later in the line-up and in the evening to have a larger audience and more heated up people in front of them. But even at the quite early hour, the applause and bawling was great. A simple "Thank you" at the end of the gig also worked miracles and the Swedes of SPETSNAZ were a small highlight of the festival early in the day.
The first band to get hit by the seemingly declining sound inside the venue, were the Dutchmen of :: GRENDEL ::. Paul's electric guitar which is used often in contrast to other harsh EBM/Industrial beats fell into oblivion except for a few riffs and the volume of both singers, JD (vocals) and Mel (keys & vocals), varied unfortunately in some songs. This way, hits like Time Wave Zero went down a bit sounding more loveless presented as they actually were. Despite this, GRENDEL could continue exploiting the overall mood of the fans which was still good from the previous Spetsnaz. And even if there was a lack of mosh-pits you could see the movements of most visitors up to the last rows and look into enthusiastic faces, caused also due to the singer JD who kept interacting with fans. I think with different sound equipment, the GRENDEL show would have been more of an experience since with their thick safety vests and body painting the visual effect was already there.
One hour of playtime implies that from now on the big ones of dark electronic music would appear on stage. It also felt like there were a quarter more people in front of the stage who wanted to celebrate the top acts of the festival henceforth. The Danes of :: LAETHER STRIP :: broke rightly the first ground. Since the late 80s, this band influenced both, Industrial and EBM forerunners such as Nine Inch Nails, Wumpscut and Suicide Commando, but also metal bands like Fear Factory followed the example of LEAETHER STRIP for their remixes of songs. Synth master Kurt Grünewald was smiling pleasantly in the background and surrendered the stage to mastermind Claus Larsen, who animated and interacted with the crowd. Brief announcements like Fuck You, Putin! and already even the opening song Kill A Raver were a bang on target of the fans’ attendance and heated up the mood further… and the mosh pit was reopened. Not later than the sixth song Crash Flight 232, fists were swung; no one minded his vocal cords and the nearly the entire crowd moved to the beats. Japanese Bodies was frenetically celebrated by the crowd and for the first time, several encore shouts were arising. It would have been ideal to have LEAETHER STRIP play directly after Spetsnaz for that constant old-school feel, but even so it was a power that no one could resist in front of the main stage.
Many technicians on stage, projectors being installed, light tests, a drum kit, five programming computers, four synth systems… it is time for something that goes beyond a normal listening experience. As a further peculiarity there was no announcement in advance for this band. All other bands e introduced on stage by Honey. Along to loud cheers and applause, the members of the Slovenian avant-garde group :: LAIBACH :: took the stage, singer Milan Fras, with his distinctive, charismatic appearance and his distinctive headgear was last. Together with singer and synth player Mina Špiler, front man Milan presented a music theatre with mostly playback announcements and rehearsed movements. Even grabbing the water bottle was well thought out and celebrated. In the background, the projector presented marching boots and women's shoes, blue and white wispy clouds, geometric and color patterns, dancing skeleton armies and some more. During the song Under The Iron Sky, the official video with film clips from the science fiction movie Iron Sky was shown. The auditorium was under a spell during most of the hour and the movements were very reserved. However, by songs like No History, Alle gegen Alle or Tanz mit Laibach, EBM and post-industrial muscles were awakened again and one was pulled out of the fascinated rigor a bit. As the first band of the evening, LAIBACH was allowed to play the (planned) encore Leben heißt Leben. On the technical side one has to say that you could see the band didn´t leave the stage setting to chance and also their own lighting ensured a suitable mood. I am not sure if they bought their own sound engineer or relied on the festival technician, but there was every now and then an annoying feedback which was increasing during the show. But it luckily only disrupted the overall experience a bit. LAIBACH for sure is a musical and visual event. Staged art that is only known from a few bands and nearly 35 years of experience as a band and art ensemble are also reflected in the overall rating of this festival show.
A band being active for 25 years now and that was even nominated twice for the music prize Echo should get a big stage for their performance of course! It all seemed as usual as always with striking painting and hairstyles, two drum kits, two synths with programming and Peter Spilles as the usual cornerstone of the Dark Electro/Wave group from Hamburg. Timekiller opened the set of :: PROJECT PITCHFORK :: and the audience responded very gratefully by singing and dancing along. Even with the next songs, Blood-loss (Sometimes) and Acid Ocean, they kept the good mood up. But with further duration it tilted slightly, thanks to the bad sound only sounding like a big whole bass drum and the too dark and foggy lighting. It would have been nice at least to see the band every now and then. Halfway through the setlist, especially during songs like Rescue and Fire And Ice, the volume became so unbearable for most of the show that people drew back or walked out entirely of the room. In addition, long-lasting strobe light effects forced some fans to turn away from the stage as well. With closed eyes and ear plugs and a good fan attitude it was a performance that could be named solid. Everyone else was probably glad that it was over after an hour.
:: VNV NATION :: - the headliner of the festival had 80 min playing time now, time to cheer up the stricken audience. Since almost 25 years mastermind and singer Ronan Harris presents Future Pop and Industrial dance compositions to the fans. Together with two live keyboarders, the British-Irish duo Ronan Harris and long-time electronic drummer Mark Jackson started the evening with the quiet Legion. Here it was already clear how much the fans were waiting for their songs because it took only a brief gesture of Harris’ hand and the crowd screamed and clapped what often summoned a surprised, joyful head-shaking on stage. There was a lot of interaction with the audience, both during the songs, as well as between them and the band and fans goaded each other so that it sounded too enthusiastic and too much like a motivational seminar to some people in front of the stage. On the other hand some, especially female fans, briefly stroked a tear away during songs like Resolution. There remains a slightly ambivalent opinion from the human standpoint on whether and how to win over an audience. Musically, there is little to mention, even if it sometimes felt like Ronan Harris is sometimes very easy on the text lines and their pronunciation. Likewise, the emotion was a little too aggressive or bored in some places, but that partly depended on ever-changing volume and ever-annoying feedback which doesn't make the life of an artist more convenient. Even though VNV NATION was headliner and end of the festival you have already experienced them in better quality. It's hard to tell whether it was only because of the very modest sound system or also the artistic mood. Anyway true fans of VNV NATION enjoyed the close and frequent contact with front man Ronan Harris and idealized the songs so that it was a beautiful conclusion of a black electronic day.
From the view of the main stage, it was overall a good, solid festival with ups and downs, both artistically as well as technically. The line-up should have been arranged slightly differently as some bands diverged too much from the genre of the previous one and because of that, they had to fight for the audience's favor first. |
story © Markus Lambertz • pics © Dani Vorndran & Black-Cat-Net |
