On Friday evening my friend and I went to our local venue, The Rave, for a night of extreme death and black metal mayhem. This concert again was in ‘The Rave Underground,’ which leads me to believe all metal shows at this venue will be in the basement from now on. Even so, this place was packed for this show. Quite a number of people showed up and honestly they really should have had it upstairs on the bigger stage, but perhaps they didn’t expect such a huge turnout. Enough small talk though, let’s get to the action.
Lecherous Nocturne: Up first from Greenville, South Carolina is Lecherous Nocturne, a band that was completely unknown to me before their gig, but it seems there foundation dates all the way back to 1997. Since then they’ve released two demos, an EP and full length albums in 2006 and 2008. As far as their style is concerned these guys played relentless brutal death metal with plenty of energy to get the crowd moshing and head banging right from the start. I don’t really get into this sort of music that much anymore, but they seemed to be diverse enough to keep my attention while they played out their set. They were even handing out some CDs during their set to the people that were causing the most chaos in the pit, which is never a bad idea when you’re a mostly unknown band. So, all in all a decent set from these guys, but like I said earlier I don’t get much pleasure out of this sort of music any longer so this was most likely the first and last time I’ll hear Lecherous Nocturne.
Skeletonwitch: Following LN was Skeletonwitch from Athens, Ohio. I saw these guys about 2 ½ years ago opening for Danzig (I think), and they made a pretty damn strong impression on me, but for whatever reason I never got around to buying their CDs. Naturally I’ve remedied that blunder and now have their latest album in my hands for listening and later reviewing purposes. Anyway, Skeletonwitch’s music is a fair mix of ruthless death, thrash and black metal. The music is fast, the solos are strong, the energy is insane and the onstage battle is merciless. The band’s key feature is their singer Chance Garnett who is a very charismatic front man who easily gets the ground pumped with his onstage persona. Of course the musicians behind him do their part as well by playing smashing out some killer riffs/solos and beating the guts out of the drum kit. The band played a lot of songs from their new album as well as a few from the older releases; all of which seemed to be highly favored by the crowd. In the end I do believe everyone was happy and honestly this set was the highlight for me tonight. Of course I’ve also got my Skeletonwitch CD now to blast from my car stereo at obnoxious volumes while driving around. Oh, and Chance left us with three must do favors, 1) Drink lots of beer, 2) Smoke lots of weed and 3) Eat some fucking pussy. Well, I at least went to the bar and got another beer.
1349: Now 1349 was the true reason I wanted to come to this gig. To be fair I’ve got some love for Cannibal Corpse, but I’ve got a fuck load more love for 1349 and Norwegian black metal in general. So I was rather psyched up for their performance. This (as far as I remember) would be the first time I’d get to see some genuinely awesome Norwegian black metal, although I did catch Windir live years ago too, but I think they usually get lumped into the Viking metal genre. Anyway, a few days before the show I found out that 1349 was not going to make it to the USA for the first half of the tour because of drummer Frost’s visa issues (probably something to do with his grave desecration arrest back in the early 90’s) and also something with that ash cloud over Europe. So, needless to say I was pissed. However without any notice at all I approached the merch table before Skeletonwitch hit the stage just to find 1349 merch available and to also discover that 1349 would indeed be playing. Fantastic.
1349 took the stage in near darkness (just a few lights in the back of the stage), clad in corpsepaint, spikes, leather and the guitarist even wore some sort of hooded black robe. Absolutely what I’d expect from a Norwegian black metal band such as 1349. This whole near darkness stage light set up was actually a bit of an annoyance for me since I was in the photo pit trying to get some photos, but it was completely impossible and if any of my fellow photographers got any good shots I’d seriously like to know how they pulled it off. Anyway, 1349’s performance was quite enjoyable on this evening and I liked the fact that the band just played and didn’t bother talking to the crowd or wasting any time at all with other matters. It was quite amazing to see just how fast Frost is on the drums and I suppose it’s obvious when you hear the albums, but seeing him actually reproduce the same sound live is really something to behold. The other three members performed quite well too, and I must admit Ravn is indeed a fine black metal front man. I can’t seem to remember exactly what songs they played, but I do know that the few from the earlier releases were more favored among the crowd then the newer material they played. What seemed a little odd is that the band only played for what seemed like about 35 minutes, and after the last song they simple just walked off stage (the bassist didn’t even seem to realize is was done since he was the last one off). Nevertheless it was great to see them perform tonight and I do hope they come back as headliners some day with a few other black metal bands opening for them.
Cannibal Corpse: I’ve known about Cannibal Corpse for at least 13 or 14 years now, but I really didn’t get into them until about eight years ago when I had a temporary love affair with all things death metal related. I recall at some point I had numerous CC albums and even listened to them quite often, but I suppose in the end my love for black metal won over my brief interest in brutal death metal.
After a short break Cannibal took the stage and proceeded to tear this place up. The band ripped and shredded through songs like ‘Disfigured,’ ‘Scattered Remains, Splattered Brains,’ ‘Evisceration Plague,’ ‘Gutted,’ ‘Pounded into Dust’ and ‘Pit of Zombies as well as popular numbers like, ‘Fucked with a knife,’ A Skull full of maggots’ and of course ‘Hammer Smashed Face.’ The thing that sort of threw me off however was simply the fact that the band would always take a little break between each song and Corpsegrinder would either say something to the crowd or just try to get the crowd pumped up. As far as I remember they only played two songs in a row without these little breaks. Nevertheless this was a decent performance, but it’s honestly been a while since I really listened to CC so even the songs that probably should have got me going were not winning me over much.
It’s hard to imagine that Cannibal Corpse has been at it for twenty two years now but I can only assume they’ll continue on as long as Corpsegrinder is able to growl and the rest of the band is able to play and headbang while delivering some of the sickest death metal imaginable to the masses.
Full size photos from this show are available here.
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