Amon Amarth, Enslaved, Skeletonwitch - 1/31/14 at Fillmore, Silver Spring, MD

First show of the year, and I don't even get to it until a week later. That's just my life.

Well, so we went to see Amon Amarth. They were one of the first metal bands I got into, so I think they'll always be one of my top bands :) Besides, Johan Hegg is one of my idols as far as vocals go. I wish I could growl like him. (But since I'm a girl, I don't think my voice will ever be able to go that low.) I was actually looking forward to Enslaved more, though, because they were amazing last time we saw them. I didn't care much about Skeletonwitch; they're better than decent, but I wondered why they couldn't find another Viking-themed band for this tour.

When we got to the venue, they were screening the video for "Father of the Wolf." We were with S's brother and niece, and I tried to convince them to go in and watch the video, but they were hesitant for a while, so the video was almost over by the time we actually went into the stage area.

Not soon after, Ohio's blackened thrash outfit Skeletonwitch took the stage. The Fillmore's stellar sound system did them justice - they sounded better and clearer than I've ever heard them. I got a sort of death metal vibe from them this time, although that may have just been the thundering sound. They definitely did have an Amon Amarthy vibe to some of the leads though, with an epic or rolling sound. I noticed some thrashy and black metal moments, too, but my overall impression was much more groovy and melodic than I remembered them being. So it was a pretty entertaining set.

The experience of seeing Norway's progressive black band Enslaved was also different from the last time we saw them. Then, we saw them at the rather small Ottobar in Baltimore. We were probably less than twenty feet away from them, and they clearly towered over everyone in the venue (they're all incredibly tall, either that or they wear tall shoes). This time they were just distant figures, dwarfed by a large stage. They got off to a slow start with newer songs from Riitiir, but things intensified with "Ethica Odini." And two songs after that, I was very glad to find that they're still playing one of their oldest songs, "Allfáðr Oðinn," which is one of their best - it's my favorite, anyway. "Riitiir" also sounded surprisingly good. With the bigger venue and shorter set, their performance was not as intense as when we saw them at Ottobar, but I still enjoyed it.

We wondered what props Amon Amarth, Sweden's death metal Vikings, would have, considering that last time we saw them, they brought along a whole Viking ship. They turned out not to have much, just some banners of Viking warriors in front of their huge banner of the cover of Deceiver of the Gods. They also started out a little weak with two new songs. But as they thundered into the third song, "Death by Fire," I felt like the show really got started, and the intensity didn't let up till the end. Johan Hegg complained of a cold, but it didn't seem to affect his vocals, just making his speaking voice rough like his vocals. I felt like "Destroyer of the Universe" and a couple songs right after it were a little off, as though they were trying to play faster and not everyone could keep up. They finished up with "War of the Gods," which sounded much more epic than when they played it at Jaxx a couple years ago. But they weren't done - soon, thunder rumbled through the hall, introducing "Twilight of the Thunder God." The crowd was invited to sing along for the chorus. Then the band launched into "Pursuit of Vikings" and everyone went crazy - the whole floor seemed to be jumping, and I hear the middle of the floor was wild (we were at the very back).

Before leaving the stage, Johan Hegg invited everyone to stay and watch the video for "Father of the Wolf" (perhaps not knowing it had already been shown) but it didn't actually play and pretty soon the staff began encouraging us to leave.

Considering I was rather, um, unamped for this show, I had a great time. We got solid performances from all three bands, but Amon Amarth obviously ruled the night.

Concert Review - Slayer, Gojira, 4Arm - 11/19/13 at the Fillmore, Silver Spring, MD

So, everyone I knew was really excited about this concert. I was not, because going to this meant missing the Overkill/ Kreator/ A Sound of Thunder show on Friday, which had been on my calendar for months, and for which I had already promised to start a pit for ASOT's "Blood Vomit." So ever since realizing this conflict, I had been cursing "F**king Slayer" all over the place. Because I had never seen Slayer, and figured I needed to before my chance is gone.

Add to that the scheduling nightmare that is my three-job-single-parent life, and I was not a happy camper long before the day of the show.

Day of I actually started to feel better - the sheer excitement of just getting to leave normal life behind for a few hours and go to a show got me feeling a bit amped as I was driving from my second work shift of the day to the venue. But I had hardly gotten inside before my mood turned down again. The place was already packed and it was only the middle of 4Arm's set. With all my energy having been channeled into the two demanding intellectual projects that loom over the rest of my workload, I had nothing to offer anyone around me - I didn't want to see, hear or talk to anyone, not even people I knew. I just wanted to get my food from the bar, see Gojira's set and go take a nap.

I glanced at 4Arm as I waited to place an order for chicken in waffles (yes, that's what it was actually called, and yes, the chicken was literally in the waffle dough itself). 4Arm was fast, thundering thrash that made the bar shake, a pretty good distraction from hunger and from the annoyance of being surrounded by people.

After they stopped shaking the walls, I was able to place my order and then some obligatory hellos were said. S talked to people and I watched the sign that displays the numbers for food orders. I finally got my food...right as Gojira took the stage, of course. They were louder and heavier than I expected - perhaps a side effect of the place being tuned for thundering thrash metal that night - and also had a much stronger groove than you get from listening to their recordings. Their performance of "Flying Whales" turned out to be possibly the heaviest thing I've ever heard (and I'm comparing this to bands like Suicide Silence). To my disappointment, the weird guitaring at the beginning that sounds like whalesong wasn't audible, but in the bridge near the end, I could just pick them out, like a whale struggling in a net of riffs, and then something that I can only refer to as a bass drop flattened the place. It was the heaviest matter in the universe, for sure. Next or shortly thereafter they played "L'Enfant Sauvage," a song from their new album that gets a lot of radio play, but that I never really got into. Live it sounded pretty cool, though - the whimsical little melodies and the tribal rhythm of the drums definitely gave it the feeling of a "wild child" running free. Later on I heard someone talking about them and saying they had sounded better somewhere else, and that's probably true - at this venue, the subtleties of their music were drowned out in the loudness and heaviness. Still, having never seen them before, I enjoyed this taste of their live sound.

After their set, people started surging off the floor toward the bars and bathrooms, and my frayed nerves found the constant contact incredibly irritating, so I tried to stake out a spot by a pillar at the back where no would need to brush past me, but as the floor filled up again it started to be so crowded that even there people were pushing past me. By the time Slayer started, I was so fed up with I thought I might punch anyone (besides S) who spoke to or touched me. Perhaps I should have gone in the pit to vent my frustration - but I probably wouldn't have emerged in one piece, considering the number of football-player types at the show and the intensity of the music. Besides, as I've said before, it's not right to be angry in the pit.

Slayer finally started, and they were, from an objective standpoint, amazing. I don't listen to Slayer enough to really judge, but as far as I could tell they were spot on musically; they were loud and intense, and augmented the effect with blistering strobe light effects that might as well have been machine gun fire. I swear they played even faster than their recordings - amazing that after over 30 years they can still produce that kind of ferocity. The effect of the upside down crosses hanging at angle, which made it look as though they were diving toward the ground, was pretty cool, too. In a better mood, I might have had a great time. As it was, I bobbed my head to some particularly catchy moments, but mostly stood there waiting for it to be over. With the crowd and the lights and the moshing, it was like standing in a sauna. Finally I excused myself to the bathroom, and sat downstairs for most of the second half of the set. Then, I heard the opening chords of "Raining Blood," and S texted me about the same, and I knew I couldn't miss this - so I went upstairs and stood just back from the door - away from the crowd - and caught the last part of the song. I joined S on the floor for the encore - "South of Heaven" and "Angel of Death." I don't get "South of Heaven"; it sounds like the wimpy cousin of "Raining Blood." But "Angel of Death" was intense.

Even though I hated being there, I'm glad I went, and not just because now I can check seeing Slayer off my bucket list. They were phenomenal; of the three of the Big Four that I've seen (Megadeth and Anthrax being the others) they by far put on the most vicious and merciless show. I'm a little disappointed actually that my bad mood prevented me from enjoying them. But at least I enjoyed Gojira, so the evening wasn't a total downer.

Next show: Rob Zombie and Scar the Martyr on 11/27, I hope!

Concert Review - Vektor, Earthling, Borracho, Midnight Eye, Asthma Castle - 9/26/13 at Fillmore, Silver Spring, MD

I headed over to DC Heavy Metal's 4th Anniversary Party after a meeting in Edgewater, and got there just in time to see the headliner, science fiction themed thrash band Vektor. (But I like to tag everyone for future reference - "I coulda seen those guys, but...")  And I'm sure glad I made the effort - it was worth the long night and the frantic change of clothes at a friend's house, and a great start to a three night streak of concerts.

 I wouldn't call myself a giant thrash fan, but I definitely appreciate a good thrash show for the intense aggressive energy that the band and the audience put out - and Vektor was one of the best thrash shows I've seen. They started off with a pensive quiet melody that reminded me of old Metallica, then launched into thundering thrash riffs that sounded great on Fillmore's superb sound system. Immediately a good sized pit broke out, and even with fries in hand it was impossible not to headbang to the earthshaking riffs. The wall of sounded subsided a bit for a great solo. Vektor's thrash has a fair bit of melody, and the science fiction themes and spacey moments also give it a unique flavor. The lighting - battle stations red, deep space blue, mystical white - also helped create the sf mood. And the singer brought the 80's into the house with his cloud of curly hair, cut into bangs in the front, and his tank top and tight jeans. (I can't see skinny jeans on guys and not think of 80's thrash metal.) My favorite song was probably the third or fourth song, "Hunger for Violence." It started off sounding like battleships pulverizing each other, or giant war machines marching over the earth - and then it got really crazy, like the mecha pilots had been knocked off their proverbial horses and were locked in melee combat.

Metal Chris uploaded a video of "Hunger for Violence." If you crank the volume to 11 you can get some idea of how it sounded!


 Toward the end of the set, they had a slow, spacey segment that evoked the reaches of the deep ocean - or deep space - with its extended, wavering notes. The lighting, with its myriad beams of light, and even the sound as they picked up the pace again reminded me of Alcest! Too weird! They ended with a final thundering segment that set the crowd churning one last time. Especially since I just found out that they're not from around here, but from Tempe Arizona, I'm so glad I made it out to see these guys - a new addition to my list of top "local" bands!

Concert Review - Killswitch Engage, Miss May I, Darkest Hour, Affiance - 6/12/13 at Fillmore, Silver Spring, MD

Killswitch Engage has been through this area a couple times in the past few years, but somehow I've never managed to get out to see them. They're the only mainstream metalcore band that I consider to be a truly good band, and not just "pretty good for a metalcore band." Their sweet guitar melodies and the heartfelt nature of their clean vocals (as opposed to annoying whiny clean vocals from most metalcore bands) make them foremost in my mind in American melodic metal. 

On this tour, they were supposed to be supported by As I Lay Dying, one of those bands that I consider "pretty good for a metalcore band" (PGFAMB?). They're both decent sounding and unmemorable - I don't know how many times I heard "Paralyzed" on the radio, thought, "Hey, this guitar part is pretty good," checked the info and went, "Oh. These guys again." So I was a little interested in seeing how they would sound live. But then that whole thing with Tim Lambesis trying to have his wife killed happened, and they dropped off the tour.

They were replaced by Darkest Hour, another PGFAMB. Darkest Hour, originally from DC, has some really good melodic guitar parts, but the rest of their songs don't really live up to promise of those guitar parts, generally turning into a repetitive mash of screams and banging drums that bury the guitar. I saw them last year opening for Machine Head and was not too impressed. Still, I thought I'd give them another chance, so I ambled over to the venue around their start time (leaving S to settle the bill at the Irish pub where we were waiting out the less acceptable openers, haha. He arrived two songs after I did.) They sounded much better this time than last time. They seemed louder and heavier than at Ram's Head (maybe more to do with the sound system than the band). In some songs, the bass was too loud, or there was not enough going on with guitars, but for about half their songs (that is, three out of a six song set) the guitars were fairly prominent and melodic. Also, I couldn't fault the vocalist's screams - they were delivered with metal ferocity, even deepening into death metal territory at times (such as in the last song, "Sadist Nation"). The guitar was pretty prominent in that song as well. I was pleased that I got there to see most of their set, and would probably see them again, with the hope that they keep sounding better.

I had never heard of the next support act, Miss May I. They started out very promising, high energy, the singer jumping about on stage and wearing an actual metal shirt (Sylosis), and the long-haired guitarist windmilling his hair. Their sound was certainly a sonic assault, loud and fast, with intense screams. But they had too much going on at once, which gave them a confused sound. Every now and then a melodic guitar part would sing out, but mostly the guitar was relegated to a background instrument, and everything was dominated by the hammering bass. Whenever things would calm down enough to hear the guitar, the bassist would come in with some cringe-worthy overly emo clean vocals. There were a few good parts where everything was together, and a nice thundering breakdown in the second to last song, but mostly I found them kind of a mess.

Fortunately, Killswitch Engage made the night worth it. As I said, I like them mostly for their sweet guitar melodies, so I was surprised to find they were much more hardcore-oriented live - thundering bass, tank tops and short/shaved hair, and an aggressive stage manner. Of course, any band will sound heavier live, but for Killswitch Engage the shift to a hammering-bass hardcore sound totally changed the character of their music. The guitar was still perfectly audible, though, and many songs were quite guitar driven ("Life to Lifeless," "Rose of Sharyn") or melody driven (slow songs like "The Arms of Sorrow"). "My Curse" was a good combination of bass, guitar and melody - it started out thundering, but with the guitar gamely riffing away, and then softened for a melodic chorus. For the whole set, Jesse Leach's vocals were intense, in keeping with the hardcore spirit. The clean vocals were full of feeling, real feeling, not emo whininess. Jesse hardly talked besides to say "The next song is.." a couple times. Guitarist Adam D did most of the talking, including joking with the audience (inviting fans to suck his tits, calling for a "circle pit of love" ie. holding hands, and claiming he could smell someone menstruating - he had to be cut off by Jesse at that point). I also thought it was amusing that, being quite tall and decently muscled, he looked so out of proportion to his guitar that it looked like a toy. I enjoyed their set even though I didn't know most songs, which is unusual for me. There was enough energy with the powerful bass and their lively stage presence to keep me pumped, and enough guitar going on to keep me interested and headbanging. I will have to learn the choruses of some songs for next time though.

Next show: Tomorrow! Lamb of God, Decapitated and The Acacia Strain.

There should also be a book review at some point, because I finished a book a few weeks ago. I have been so focused on my own novel-writing that I haven't had much time for reviews, and that's why the concert reviews have been so slow! But things should calm down toward the end of June.

Concert Review - Death to All, Exhumed, Anciients - 4/26/13 at Fillmore, Silver Spring, MD

Death is one of those groundbreaking bands I thought I'd never get to see live, on account of coming to the metal scene so late. So I was pretty stoked to hear that original members of Death were doing this charity benefit tour as Death to All. Funny though, before hearing about Death to All, I actually hadn't listened to Death that much, for whatever reason. I may or may not have streamed some full albums on youtube the week before the show, and then got really, really stoked about seeing them, cause I realized that they were absolutely amazing. When you think about the fact that at the time, nobody else was really doing what they were doing, it's even more amazing.

I was so busy listening to Death that I didn't look into the openers. The first band to come on was Anciients, from Vancouver, Canada, a band whose sound varies from meandering stoner guitars to much more energetic and headbangable riffs with a black metal feel. They started out a bit soft and slow - most of their songs began with stoner-ish intros - but then quickly got loud and heavy, once the jackhammer bass and drums kicked in. They used mostly clean mellow vocals, some growled harsh vocals. Their style of mixing clean and harsh vocals in songs such as "Overthrone" reminds me of Enslaved, right down to the vocal tone. This song features some of the their fastest and most prominent guitar work; usually the guitars stayed pretty mellow and were drowned out by the pounding bass and drums when things got heavy. This meant that although they were nice and heavy, the heavy parts were a little repetitive. I still enjoyed their set much more than I might have predicted from the first five seconds, though, and even discovered that I liked listening to "Overthrone" again later.

I didn't know what to expect from Exhumed, either, except that based on the name, I figured they would be a typical death metal band. They were fast, a whirlwind of sound with machine gun fast drums, and surprisingly technical guitar solos. There was just a small pit for most of their songs, which was surprising considering the intensity of the music, but perhaps the "Absolutely no moshing or crowd surfing" signs of the venue were having some effect (ironically, the pillars where the signs were posted had been covered in padding, as though we were fully expected to break the rule in a violent way). Their screamed vocals and intricate guitar work gave their music a bit of a black metal flavor, especially in their newest songs (they played a couple of brand new songs that had only been played on their concurrent tour with Suffocation), while a really old song they played (the singer said it was old and crusty like his mom) had a more thrashy sound. S. saw them the night before with Suffocation and said they sounded much better here at the Fillmore, probably due to their superior sound system.

Exhumed had some interesting stage antics - an "evil doctor" in a blood spattered apron came out with a chainsaw (S. said it was a real chainsaw, because at Empire one could smell the gas), which he waved over the crowd and even jumped down into the crowd with; then later during a guitar solo, he used a defibrillator to try to the revive the guitarist, who I guess had been overcome by his own awesomeness, to no success, heaving finally to resort to beer; he also stage-dived and crowd-surfed, and finally brought out a severed head and squirted green goo onto some hapless fan in the pit.

When Death to All finally came out, I was feeling pretty tired, and so got a bit distracted during their set. They seemed to put on a solid performance, although not being terribly familiar with their songs or having ever seen them live with Chuck Shuldiner, I can't say how true to the original they sounded. The line-up was guitarist Paul Masvidal, bassist Steve DiGiorgio, and drummer Sean Reinert who were once members of Death, and vocalist Max Phelps, the touring vocalist for Cynic; at least that's the line-up according to Metal Injection, I can't say if they were the ones who actually appeared. Halfway through the set, they switched drummers, so I'm not sure who that was.

As would be expected, they had a thundering thrashy sound, with vocals that seemed a bit more growled than what I remembered hearing on my youtube spree. They were also masters, in the way of Sabbath and Celtic Frost, of using the guitars to make haunting sounds that created a sort of weird, creepy atmosphere in the intros of some songs.

In the middle of the set, there was a photo and video tribute to Chuck Shuldiner, which was cool to see. The crowd was very appreciative. The venue was not filled - the upstairs and side areas were closed, but there seemed to be several hundred people there at least.

As a tribute to a pioneering musician and a chance to see a band from another era, I thought this was a great show, definitely a worthwhile evening for any fan of death metal.

S. also wrote a review with setlists and posted photos.

Next show: Arsis, 4/30. Not sure what happened to my two concerts a month pledge :/ Gonna work on that in May, really.

Lamb of God, In Flames, Hatebreed, Sylosis - 11/17/12 at Fillmore, Silver Spring, MD

I was really looking forward to this show. Three great bands, what could go wrong?

We got to the venue just as Sylosis was finishing up. I heard their last song; S went to get a drink. They were pretty listenable, with some energetic and melodic segments, but didn't especially catch my interest.

Hatebreed came out to "America, F**k Yeah" from Team America and immediately got everyone pumped. Pretty much the whole floor was jumping and singing along with Jamey Jasta. I'm surprised I wasn't hoarse after their set cause I sang along to most of the choruses in a low growl, which I didn't even know I could sustain that long. They had a very simple stage show - just the guys playing and Jamey moving around the stage - but they really brought the hardcore energy and got everyone moving with their anthemic and sing/shout-alongable songs (singing along was encouraged by Jamey on just about every song).

They were followed by Swedish melodeath band In Flames, who started with a mellow song and sort of sounded like an 80's rock band compared to Hatebreed. I know In Flames gets a bad rap for not being metal anymore or something, and for not playing some song that everybody really likes, but I thought they sounded all right. They were heavier than I expected, and as they went "back in time" playing older songs, they started to sound more energetic and thunderous. They still had some slow mellow segments in each song, though, and ended with a slow song. There some surprisingly large pits during their set, though, so perhaps they still have some metal cred.

Lamb of God was excellent, and to date the only band I've seen that could share a stage with Hatebreed and outshine them (granted, I've only seen Hatebreed once before). They were loud, fast and heavy, filling the hall with a thunderous barrage of sound, and had lights, spouts of smoke and videos augmenting their performance (no fire for In Flames at the Fillmore - just some banks of lights that blinded the audience). The bass was very loud and the vocals pretty low, so much so that I could hardly hear Randy at first, but I noticed it less as the show went on. The fast but rhythmic music was great for headbanging, and luckily not all of the floor turned into the pit, but we did get shoved a bit.

The show turned out just as good as I hoped. I would recommend it to any metalhead - these are bands you should definitely see if you're into heavy music at all, and you won't be disappointed (unless you expect In Flames to be something that they're not anymore *shrug*)

Next show: I think it's Sonata Arctica and Arsis on 12/9, unless I'm forgetting about something. And after that, Eluveitie and WINTERSUN on 12/19.

Dethklok, All That Remains, Machine Head, Black Dahlia Murder - 11/2/2012 at the Fillmore, Silver Spring, MD

The reviews for November will probably be a little abbreviated, because NaNoWriMo has taken over my usual method of note-taking at concerts (texting to email) and the back-up method I discovered (my phone's notepad) is pretty limited. But at least I can give you a general idea.

Anyway, I was looking forward to most of this line-up - except All That Remains. They didn't impress me last year, and the new song they've been playing on the radio seemed wimpy to me. The other bands all seemed like they'd put on a good show, though. Black Dahlia Murder's music is fast and intense, while Dethklok has some of the epic melodic feel of European metal (never mind the hilarious characters). I thought the highlight would be Machine Head, though. They were great when I saw them earlier this year, and I really respect Rob Flynn's songwriting and guitar skills. (On a halfway related note, Suicide Silence opened for them then, and I'm really glad I had a chance to see them, cause they were great as well.)

We were very lucky that this show wasn't earlier, because the first couple of shows on the tour had been canceled due to Hurricane Sandy. So this was actually the first show of the tour.

We got to the venue just as Black Dahlia Murder was starting. (It was exactly 6:30, the time the show was supposed to start, and the rest of the night continued just as precisely, with all the bands going on within ten minutes of their scheduled times.) As expected, they were loud and fast, an intense barrage of sound. They play something like a fusion of fast thrashy riffs with vocals that go from low death growl to black metal shriek in the space of one word - great energetic music. The singer looked like he was having a great time, grinning and jumping about, and the crowd did too - there were only a few small pits, but during several songs pretty much everyone in the front half of the floor started jumping up and down. I had too much stuff with me to jump, but I headbanged pretty happily, especially when they played my favorite song, "Stirring the Seas of Salted Blood." S. said he hoped the singer wouldn't take off his shirt - but he did just before the last song.

Machine Head played the third slot, which came as a little of a surprise and disappointment. I thought they were much more qualified for the second slot than ATR, and I wanted to hear more of their music. Since they were amazing last time I saw them, I had my standards set pretty high, and was disappointed at first - they sounded muddy and the vocals were too low, barely audible at times. (Also, the floor, which had seemed pretty full for BDM, had filled up even more, and Rob Flynn being a little short, I couldn't see him much of the time.) They hit their stride in their third song, however - "Aesthetics of Hate," which they dedicated to the late Mitch Lucker of Suicide Silence, and also included a Dimebag Darrell tribute in their visuals. (Right before their set, we were standing by the merch area when a kid in a Suicide Silence t-shirt came up, and one of the merch guys asked if he would let Rob wear his shirt on stage. The kid happily agreed, but apparently Rob didn't have time to put on the shirt, because it was just hanging off the drum kit.) Finally, in this song the guitars began blasting and Rob's vocals sounded stronger, and they killed for the remainder of the set. They played "Locust" a bit faster than they do on the album, making a cool song even better. Their set was soon over, though; it was only five or six songs. I was rather disappointed at the short set, and that we didn't get to hear "Darkness Within," which is my favorite off their newest album.

As a result I felt a little bitter toward All That Remains, but I ended up being pleasantly surprised by them. With the longer set, I was able to hear them play a wider range of songs, and got a better appreciation for their sound. They're also much heavier and intense live than on their recordings - "Down Through the Ages" sounds so much better live than on the radio. During this show, I noticed their guitar work for the first time - I'd never noticed before that their songs had such powerful and melodic guitars. They moved through a range of styles, from anthemic hard rock/classic metal-style songs, to metalcore shouted verses/clean choruses, to the unintelligible death growls at the end of "Some of the People, All of the Time" (is that why it's my favorite ATR song?), and even some grindingly heavy segments. I don't know if this makes me any more likely to listen to their albums (might still find them wimpy) but I was definitely satisfied with their live performance.

After all this, Dethklok was just icing on the cake, but they easily carried the night. They sounded great, with flawless speedy guitar playing and growled vocals delivered by Brendon Small and co. (He had Gene Hoglan on drums; I didn't recognize any other names.) They played several songs off the newest album ("I Ejaculate Fire," "Andromeda," "The Galaxy," "Crush the Industry") as well as classics like "Murmaider" and "Awaken." I wasn't sure what to expect as I'd never seen Dethklok live and wondered how exactly an animated band was going to perform live. Without spoiling too much, they basically showed the music videos for the songs on a large screen, with the stage darkened so that one wouldn't pay too much attention to the live musicians below. There were a few recorded interludes including talking-to's from Facebones and the Dethklok manager, Dr. Rockzo calling for crowd participation, a plot by the Tribunal and some "backstage" antics by the band. The best part, though, had to be the part before the last song of the encore, when all the lights went off except one red one shining straight into the audience and entirely obscuring the stage, and (presumably) Brendon Small proceeded to banter with the audience in the voices of all the band members. (And he talked about Hurricane Sandy, so I'm pretty sure it wasn't entirely scripted - maybe prepared earlier that day, but not a script for the whole tour.) At that moment, it felt almost like the Dethklok band from the show was actually there in the hall (of course, we're probably lucky that they weren't, because that wouldn't have ended well for half or more of the audience). They picked a sort of lackluster song to end on - good, but not as great as the others - but the second to last song (first song of the encore) was "Go Into the Water" and it was absolutely epic.

This was a great show, even with the disappointment about playing order and the first half of Machine Head's performance - Dethklok more than made up for the that, and the rest was pretty enjoyable too.

Next show: was Six Feet Under, Cattle Decapitation and Wretched, 11/3 - the review for this will go up soon.