Suicidal Angels - Resistance

Once again, a Metal concert took place in the location called Seifenfabrik – and it was an interesting event for the about 300 metal fans in the established venue. The program turned out to be alternating because of different styles of music, but the sound technicians could not manage to deliver a downright cool job. Unfortunately, the very good bands start the evening with a quite bad basis concerning their sound.

:: RESISTANCE – the opener without impelling effect

Right in time, the first chords of RESISTANCE come to our ears at 6:30 pm. We enter the hall and were expected by... emptiness! Fortunately, a bunch of listeners find their way to the stage during the performance, but the mood in the venue is quite unsatisfying and the energy level quite low. I do not know if anyone knew the band, which plays a mixture of Death Metal and Hardcore attitude. The one and only eye-catcher is the circle-banging drummer, but apart from this, RESISTANCE offer only average music with impelling factor 0,5 on the open headbang-scale :)

:: SUICIDAL ANGELS – entertainment with enormous joy in playing

Afterwards, the Greek band SUICIDAL ANGELS sounds a lot better and knows how to enthuse their supporters. The band animates the first rows to clap along and the quite furious Thrash Metal is made for banging one’s head. The strongest moments show up when the band uses deadly grooving parts and the rhythm I always have to follow. Thereby the songs of the latest effort Sanctify The Darkness strike at best and get a lot of applause. The sentiment among the fans gets better and better with every song and the band is content with the reactions. Nice gig!

:: DARKEST HOUR – they tried, but they did not set me aflame

I have to say that I expected a downright striking performance because of the very strong album The Eternal Return, but I had the impression that the Swedish-like Death Metal could not take effect at full extent. Singer John’s voice did show up way too silent and this instance caused a sound deficit. In contrast, the lead guitars were set in scene perfectly and they outbalanced the lacking voice’s sound. The two guitarists performed in egregious manner and some songs are blessed with continuous nice lead melodies. One of the highlights named The Tides offered a little bit of technical problems and could not unfold the irresistible effect of the middle part like on the record. In contrast, the very felicitous song Deliver Us showed up in very cool style; the band unleashed enormous power and the guitar front cared for the one or other blink on the technical freak’s face.

:: BELPHEGOR – Steiermark, this is blood fucking death metal!

Singer Hellmuth made once again clear that he is not a genius concerning rhetoric subjects. Apart from this instance, his voice, which was a little bit silent anew, sounded bleak and sinister. Unfortunately, the band only performed at best during the first three songs. Afterwards, the musicians as well as the fans made a boring impression. I liked that BELPHEGOR did not set their focus on fast songs only. They acted in mid tempo every now and then. As I mentioned above, the group did not appreciate the crowd’s reactions and so they left the stage after only 30 minutes without one single word of explanation. The surprised listeners did not really know how to act, but we are used to uncommon decisions like that by the extravagant Austrian horde...of course, such reactions are not professional at all.

:: KATAKLYSM – what a headliner!

After a few seconds it was clear: the sound showed up in much better style and louder than it was during the four bands before. What a pity that it lasted that long to get full light and sound for the entry fee...ok, the evening showed clearly, how perfect the music by the kings of northern hyperblast fits the stage. Many groovy passages contributed to the music’s catchiness, but nevertheless a pinch of technical finesse was adopted to enthuse the musical gourmets. Singer Maurizio animated his supporters in sympathetic way continuously and his companion unleashed full power on stage in precise way. Thereby I could get aware of many nice melody arcs besides double bass adoptions and blastbeats. KATAKLYSM used the unloaded playing time of 90 minutes for a cool program cross their career. Some steam hammers like Manipulator Of Souls or Let Them Burn were mingled with the typical mid tempo grenades As I Slither or Blood In Heaven and this mixture cared for best mood among the crowd. The felicitous performance was crowned by the unbelievable drummer Max Duhamel, who played extreme blasts and neck-breaking breaks ? in breathtaking manner. In the end it was obvious why some bands are just good and others like KATAKLYSM rule on the throne.

story © Leo • pics © Julia