The night kicked off with Denouncement Pyre taking the stage. I’ve seen this guys open for acts many times now and they are always great. Perfect combination of black and thrash metal they have a great presence on stage and real old school vibe. Very much in the vain of early Celtic Frost and Sodom or Destruction. Even as far as wear make up similar to that of Tom G Warrior. They got a great reaction from the crowd as they always do.
Up next was Inquisition who are a band I’ve heard much about and even enjoyed their music but i’ve not know much about them. Needless to say I was shocked when only a drummer and a guitarists came out on stage and absolutely tore the house down. For a 2 man band they had such a stage presence and pure intensity in their playing I was completely blown away. Front man/guitarists Dagon has a great deeper kind of vocals instead of the traditional screeching black metal vocals we’re used to. To get that big of a sound live from just drums, guitar and vocals was amazing. Non stop intense black metal and I was loving every minute of it. For a band from Columbia that I had kinda of written of as just another corpse paint wearing black metal band in a ever growing see of those kinds of bands they really won me over that night and made me a fan.
Finally it was time for Marduk. They came out and straight away tore into their classic 1999 album “Panzer Division Marduk” playing the album from start to finish. Now this album is pretty special to me because it was the first ever black metal album I ever heard back when I was 13 and its always stuck with me as my favourite black metal album of all time. Sure they’re are probably better or more influential albums out there but this to me is the pinnacle. Was amazing to hear “Baptisim By Fire”, “Christ Raping Black Metal” and “Fist Fucking Gods Planet” live and they band were on point they literally tore through the entire album so quickly it was just in awe.
Next the tore through their 1993 classic album “Those Of The Unlight” which was a ground breaking album for the band at the time and again they really managed to tear through the whole album at record speed. Literally burning through tracks like “On Darkened Wings”, “Burn My Coffin” and “Stone Stands Its Silent Vigil” the crowd was eating it up and wanting more which was completely the opposite of last time I saw them. When I saw them in 2013 the crowd were bored and basically stood their with them arms cross. Tonight there was some serious moshing with the pit growing as the show went on. The band then played through a few newer songs and for their encore closed with the title track from their 2012 album “Serpent Sermon”. I was amazed at how intense they were on stage compared to the lack of energy they seemed to have last time when I saw them. The show was amazing from start to finish. All bands performed amazingly and on the eve of Marduk releasing their brand new album “Frontschwein” I expect them to be back very soon.
