Tuesday March 20th, a very promising Black Metal package stopped by at the Turock club. Too bad it turned out to be a scandalous gig with far reaching consequences in the end. But: more of that later on.
When I arrived at the club few minutes before the scheduled kick-off, the hall was already quite well-filled, an over the whole evening, I think there was a peak count of about 250 fans in attendance. Just after I could manage to get me a first beer, the first act started.

:: KOLDBRANN :: are one of my favorite bands of that genre, as they were able to fully convince me with their second album Moribund. Of course I was curious if their already good performance seen at the last tour with Sarkom (Dajana an me reported) might have improved. One striking difference I noticed was the rather normal look, besides Fordervelse behind his drum kit, they rest of the guys looked nearly normal, at least compared to their last show at this location. Struggling with little sound problems and a somehow unmotivated crowd, KOLDBRANN started off with two songs of the most recent release, but when Kaosmanifest started, the first fans in front started to bang their heads. Most likely most of the people in pit liked the older more, as there was the most action when songs from the first full length album Nekrotisk Invision were played. The show closed, in my opinion too early, with the great Inkvisitor Renegat. Nice that I will be able too see at least this band some days later at the Tomahawk Festival.
Setlist: Alt Er Befengt, Steinet Til Jorden, Kaosmanifest, Frau Allvars Veg, Pogrom Perfident, Djevelens Treskeverk // Inkvisitor Renegat

:: URGEHAL :: seemed to bet he prime cause fort he most fans to visit this show. From the first song on, there was already more Moshpit action then at any of Koldbranns (although they had deserved it as much in my opinion). One of the guitar players definitely was the optical highlight of the evening, wearing a leather-and-spikes mask before his corpsepainted face. He looked a bit like a way more evil version of Pinhead *g* URGEHAL played songs of almost all their outputs, but do to the fact they never changed their style of black metal, the whole show was like a completely rounded piece of work. With all songs at a high level, it’s hard to put a few atop the rest, but I liked Antireligious and Satanic Black Metal From Hell most, maybe because I still had them in my mind as they both come off the most recent release Goatcraft Torment. Altogether, this was a great gig. That’s the way a combination of mostly speedy traditional Black Metal with some Thrash and Black’n’Roll elements has to sound!
Unfortunately, URGEHAL cancelled the gig at the Tomahawk Festival in Osnabrueck. They told me that they simply did not want to be the opener (with less than 30 minutes stage time) after headlining the Ragnaroek one day earlier. They would have played on a later spot, but could not come to an agreement with Burningstage Concerts. Too bad…
Setlist: DoesSodomizer, Goatcraft Torment, Antireligious, Risus Sardonius, Rise The Symbols Of Satan, Matte Blodet Flamme, Doedsmarsj Til Helvete, Possessed, Satanic Black Metal From Hell, The Eternal Eclipse

So, until now, this was a great concert, any most of the people expected another good show from the third band of this evening too, although their front man was kind of infamous for his often too provocative way to perform on stage.
What followed, has to be divided into two parts:
The musical part was more than ok, the instrumentalists did a very good job, and also Hoest delivered a good performance, when you only regard his singing.
But the musical part unfortunately was of secondary interest today. The cornerstone for the following scandal was Hoest coming on stage, completely drunk and with a big black swastika painted on his chest. I did not understand his curses he yelled from time to time, but I would not be surprised if they content-wise corresponded to his appearance. Not enough with that, he threw bottles into the audience, spitted at the crowd in front of him and after the show got into a physical controversy with the Turock manager.
Great to see the audience did not like what they saw, the atmosphere quickly went down, a lot of people turned their back on the band, and no one asked for an encore after the last song.
Even though he tried to “apologize” (unarguably a bad way to apologize for using Nazi symbolic while using Nazi terminology in the same statement) later on, a few days after the show the band was kicked of the billing of all German festivals and shows they were booked for.
I can’t say whether Hoest (or his band members) really are Nazis or if it is only a very tasteless way of provocation, but I will not support anyone acting that way anymore, no matter what his intentions are. And to all those organizers who kicked them after this show: well done.

At all, although the first two bands did their best, a concert night that won’t be one of those one will like to remember.

story © Seb