Motionless In White
It’s March in the Bluegrass which means everyone in the region has basketball on their minds. Although the University of Kentucky men’s basketball team is playing (which I listened to on the 2 hour drive north to Lexington) this day was about music. Not just any kind of music – Metal! Not just any normal volume – Very Loud! Continue reading
Last Friday night (March 9th) I attended the Harm’s Way show at the Alternative Music Foundation in Berkeley, CA. The “Gilman,” as it is locally referred to because of its Gilman Street address, is a small, historical punk/hardcore venue that has hosted countless significant names in music for over the last thirty years. Groundbreaking and trendsetting acts that have gone on to receive huge notoriety or commercial success have roots that trace all the way back to early career performances there. Monumental names such as Green Day, The Offspring, AFI, Bad Religion, and Operation Ivy have all graced the Gilman stage at one time or another. Last Friday night, however, providing the metal-infused, adrenaline-fueled energy to lead today’s current generation of hardcore music was Chicago’s own Harm’s Way. Continue reading
Kreator
Sabaton, Kreator and Cyhra recently kicked off their North American tour and finally it reached the Washington DC/Baltimore area last Wednesday night. This show in Silver Spring was one of the last ones of the North American tour, the wait was grueling. This is a tour I have been waiting to cover for a while, firstly because I am a huge fan of both bands, and secondly Sabaton is a great band to photograph. I haven’t attended any show since Trans Siberian Orchestra in November, so I was extremely excited to be surrounded by metal heads. Let me dive into the review now, you can check out the photo gallery at the bottom of the page.
Just before embarking on their mini EU tour including debut shows across Germany and the Netherlands Complexity Festival alongside Carnifex, The Faceless and others, djent pioneers SikTh treated UK fans to two intimate performances with Londons Exist Immortal. Firstly at Sub 89 in Reading, and secondly to my local venue and ‘NME Best Small Venue 2012’ The Forum in Tunbridge Wells. This gig marks one of many celebrating to small 250 capacity venues’ 25th anniversary celebrations, which has a reputation of giving a stage to bands before they made it big. SikTh are locally held in very high regard where they are practically legends and it was a pleasure to have them back here once again. UK alternative hardcore act Cove were announced as openers but unfortunately had to reschedule to the following Sunday – a shame for those attending as Cove perform with such an explosive veracity that they would have put on one hell of an opening performance! Despite this slight alteration to the evening, together SikTh and Exist Immortal both delivered equally passionate and energetic performances, where their two distinctive styles accentuated one another with their mix of djent and melodic verses. Continue reading
Get The Led Out are a Led Zeppelin tribute band. They made their first ever appearance at the EKU Center For The Arts Concert Hall in Richmond, Kentucky. As the crowd eagerly awaited the opening song, a loud Bonham snare roll kicks off as the band opens up to a classic Zeppelin tune “Whole Lot Of Love” The audience immediately gets to their feet and the air is filled with flash backs to the great era when Zeppelin ruled the rock and roll air waves.
Get The Led Out are a six piece group. They are one of many Led Zeppelin cover or tribute bands in today’s music world. Being a musician and drummer myself and a HUGE Zeppelin fan, I can be very critical on anyone covering a Led Zeppelin song. I’ve seen a lot, but from what I hear from this band that separates them from the rest is they don’t try to imitate Zepplin note for note. Now, I’m not saying they couldn’t because the musicians on stage were very talented. But, they had their own sound mixed with Zeppelin that made them very distinguished from all the other Zeppelin cover/tribute bands. The drummer for the group was very talented and played very Bonham’ish. My favorite thing about the drummer was he didn’t try to be a Bonham clone (like anyone could). But his timing was spot on and he knew his way around the kit. He played a traditional Ludwig kit with the iconic Gong that is known to be identified with Bonham back in the day. Playing classics like “Dazed And Confused”, and “Stairway To Heaven” the band instantly had the crowd singing along.
The band as a whole was very entertaining and expressed lots of emotion with each song. The band covered the stage well and used the entirety of it to their advantage by interacting with the crowd and making them feel like they were part of the music magic. Paul Sinclair the man up front filling some very big shoes did a fantastic job entertaining the crowd and keeping them wanting more. Sinclair’s vocals were clean. Polished and showed that he had some range! His vocal control was outstanding and his presence on the stage was in true rock star fashion! If you want to see a very good group of musicians who do justice to the music of Led Zeppelin, I highly recommend this group.
The band has a long list of tour dates all over the East Coast, touching down in Florida, Illinois, Louisiana, New York Pennsylvania and Massachusetts, head over to their Facebook page to see if they are bringing a little Zepplin to your area.
“It’s been a long f**king time!” shouted front man Alex Erian. In fact, it’s been 11 years since Despised Icon have graced our shores with a headline set – long since 2007’s phenomenal co-headline UK/European tour with Misery Index, Annotations For An Autopsy and Beneath The Massacre. Whilst they have played the UK as recently as 2016, tonight marked a monumental occasion, firmly solidifying the Montreal metallers legacy and dominance over the Deathcore scene. For fans, this headline set may have been a long time coming but ‘The Beast’ is back and fully reawakened!
Following immediately on from their sold-out show in Antwerp, tonight’s performance at The Dome in central London marked the first leg of the UK section of this momentous comeback tour. With only a handful of tickets left on the door of this 500 capacity venue, and subsequent shows at Birmingham and Manchester expected to sell out, it was clear that everyone here was about to witness something very special. With support combining the best tech, hardcore and slam, whoever put this line-up together must be some kind of god-tier genius – for joining alongside Despised Icon were Vulvodynia, Archspire and the UK’s very own Malevolence. Missing this show was not an option!
What can be said about John 5 that has not been said a thousand times by ten thousand different people since his meteoric rise in the music business started way back when he moved to Los Angeles from Michigan at the ripe old age of 17? Hell, his resume reads like a veritable who’s who in a wide variety of genres, playing and writing with the likes of Rudy Sarzo, David Lee Roth, Paul Stanley, Marilyn Manson, Rob Halford, Rob Zombie all the way to John Wetton (Asia), Salt–N–Pepa, Ricky Martin, k.d. lang, Meat Loaf, Lynyrd Skynyrd and many, many others. One hot commodity, to say the least! Now, guitarist friends and I might say that it is his guitar playing that makes him stand apart from the rest of the crowd. Big surprise with influences like Malmsteen, Satch, Vai, Hendrix, Page, Albert Lee, Les Paul, Chet Atkins, Paul Gilbert, Bumblefoot, Jim Root, Buckethead and Eric Johnson. Others may think that it is the company that he keeps and the bands that he has played and written for that makes him great. Still others may hold the opinion that he is just plain fun to watch live. Well, I am here to tell you that all three apply to this wizard of six-string sorcery, especially having just recently been initiated into John 5 and The Creatures live show at 1904 Music Hall here in Jacksonville, FL.
The Witching Hour Tour featuring In This Moment with support from P.O.D., New Years Day and Ded was the reason to be in North Carolina on this last day of January. The sold out show at The Orange Peel in Asheville, North Carolina was my destination. Super venue, if you ever have a chance to catch a show there do not pass it up! You can always count on a crowd in Asheville to be diverse but this crowd was even more so. Each of these bands has their own fans, bring all those fans together and you’ve got a great assembly of metalheads that sang, danced, head banged their way through a tremendous night of music! Continue reading
Avatar
Avatar has long been one of those bands that dominate in their live shows and leave fans jaws on the floor not only by their sound but their amazingly entertaining stage presence. On this particular night Avatar headlined the Buckhead Theatre with opening acts Hellzapoppin Side Show and The Brains from Montreal Canada. You could say that Hellzapoppin easily fit in with Avatar’s whole theme, they aren’t a musical act but it brought something different to the show that you don’t see very often. Continue reading
This was one of those shows that I could not wait to get to; kind of like Christmas a few weeks late. Not only was I waiting to see a now legendary band, but also to see some friends I have not seen in quite a while, see a couple of bands I have not seen before and able to see a couple of favorite local bands that I have become friends with over time. Great being part of the local Metal scene here in Jacksonville! Some of the best people playing some of the best music available anywhere! Gotta love it! Thanks to GoBig Entertainment for making this show happen!
