Post by markwj on Nov 22, 2007 13:24:43 GMT
Massacre, Extreme Noise Terror, Denial Fiend, Exterminator, Ashura, Suicidal Angels
Rio’s, Leeds
18/11/07
My gig frenzy reaches another level, and I’m only half way though! A four hour drive through the sleet back from Cardiff (having used up all my daughters beginners luck in taking them to a glorious scraped draw for Wales), spectacular 12 police car and helicopter chase (not after me for a change) going the other way at Connah’s (another Irishman crying into his Guinness) Key, drop them off then two hours through the snow over the Pennines to Leeds, park up on the street, locate the relocated Rio’s, buy a drink, and the first band are on. Phew.
Rio’s in an industrial wasteland in Bradford used to be the best rock club in the North that I knew, and some best ever gigs have been seen there. In the last year though it surprisingly upped sticks to open up in a shopping centre in Leeds instead, although I know myself from good experience that this of the two cities is certainly renowned as a great place for gigs and a vibrant music scene now. Given its rather low key setting they’ve done a reasonable job in its set up, more compact and bijou than the previous version, but top quality sound and lights systems and still about 1000 capacity. Though the roof leaks. And there’s 50-60 here.
No great surprise necessarily, as this is yet anther resurrection of a death metal legend, following in the still-drying blood soaked wakes of Obituary, Bolt Thrower and (kind of) Brutal Truth of recent years. The odd thing about this though is that Massacre have always been dead, yet refusing to die. They are so old school that they were actually split and buried due to members leaving to form Death (regarded by some as the originators of the genre). It was only down to their legendary status amongst the vital tape trading network that formed this scene, listed as an influence by Napalm Death amongst others, that Earache (never one to miss an opportunity to flay a dead horse or rob a tomb) posthumously released their material with the “From Beyond” album. This classic is definitive death for me, and I was fortunate enough to work for the promoters on their early 90’s UK tour on the back of this, seeing them down at the Wulfrun Hall in Wolverhampton. Don’t recall that being particularly busy either, but their ultimately effective straightforward approach to extremity was a winner for me.
To start with we have a succession of three remarkably unremarkable Euro-metal bands. Firstly Suicidal Angels make their best efforts to kick off the brutality with some gruff speed metal riff mongering, a virtual homage to “Reign in Blood”, and lo and behold, as a finale, “Do you know Slayer?” and a cover of “Post Mortem”. Next Ashura, with their clanky nu-death, impressive collective hair-windmilling, but the largely monotone guttural grunts of the vocalist are a bit tiring after a while. Finally, Exterminator, with their proficient but dated death/thrash, rolling out a succession of clichés from the spooky organ at the vampires castle” intro to the mad, stary “evil eyes” resulting is an undercurrent of audience laughter running through their set. Especially as they, like the other two, run through the exact same extended list of thanks (this is the last night of the European tour) to all involved. As a special treat we then have a 10 man ensemble of these first 3 bands to do a cover of “Seek and Destroy” (surely that has been done to death, even by Metallica), joined by Kam Lee of Massacre, but quantity still doesn’t mean quality and I am left wondering how and why these bands got on this tour and whether anyone will ever hear of them again.
Kam Lee is back soon enough as Denial Fiend are his and fellow old stager bassist Terry Butler’s new project, that they are quite upfront about bringing back Massacre for the purpose of drawing attention to this. Taking it on face value then it is ok, a raw death style with punk riff feel at times, a somewhat cleaner sound, the drummer producing some intense double bass work. The lyrics are kept ultra basic, “Covered in blood” and “let the blood flow” summing up the variations on a theme, but Kam’s vocal delivery is as effortlessly brilliant as ever, the brutally deep growl or the demonic scream spot on. Speaking of effortless I was wondering if he’d had a stroke he was so inactive and awkwardly standing on stage, but he then explained he thought he’d cracked three ribs in some previous incident, so that would be why. They only play a short set, again acknowledging we’re all probably waiting for Massacre anyway, which can’t be argued with really. They finish though with the ultimate in obscure underground uberkvlt, a “cover” of Mantas “Legion of Doom”, Mantas being another very short lived project that featured Kam with Chuck and Rick from Death before that band, and BEFORE Massacre.
Next however is a band that I don’t mind contributing to that delay, especially as there have been some significant hold-ups in me getting to see them. Third time lucky for me to actually see the grind core/crust legends Extreme Noise Terror, as two attempts in recent years to tick them off the list have failed due to them bailing out of gigs at the last minute, much to general annoyance and damage to their reputation. Anyway, when they are finally on the stage I’m at last confident I’ll get to see them. They were a band that I’d been into since the school days listening to John Peel, favourites of his as they were near neighbours with them coming from Ipswich, and even broke in spectacular style into the wider public conscience with the collaboration with the KLF and a dead sheep at one years’ Brit Awards. They’ve kept stoically bumping along the underground, mainly playing in Europe, and foraying into a more death metal style at times, but their most recent release and tonight’s show definitely is back to their roots. Chaotic, wildly distorted, blast beats and hyper punk riffing is topped off by the raging, feral growls and screams of the dual vocals. (In between swigs of cider). There’s a variety of stuff played but to hear the older stuff like “False Profit” snarled out is a joy. A shame that after all this wait they even end up having to rush through their set, the Sunday hours could be a factor but then again I’d gladly have forsaken some of the earlier bands for more of this. My cry goes heeded as “the first song we ever wrote together in school”, “Bullshit propaganda” is played, resulting in a raw throat and stiff neck for me. This couldn’t finish even more satisfyingly as they blend it into “Carry on Screaming” (nothing to do with the film, rather addiction), and I do. Well worth the wait, I purchase the vital crust accessory, a patch!
And so to Massacre, the same confidence of expectation is there, they really can’t go wrong. There obviously is only the one album of material to air so starting of with the grand intro to opening track “Dawn of Eternity” is an obvious winner. The sound (after some early bass tech problems) is fantastic, perfect capture of their ultra-heavy straight forward riffing power. The volume seems to have been cranked to an extra level of impact as well. It is unspectacular by any sort of technical complexity standard but it’s precision and pummelling force is massive, similarities to the highly effective regular structure that Bolt Thrower also demonstrate. They have an extra guitarist, also (like Terry) from modern death metal “super-group” Six Feet Under, who provides some very tight solos, but the majority is just the thundering riffs, the atmospheric heavy breaks, all carried through by the bowels of hell growls. Naturally all the classics from their limited catalogue are rolled out, “Biohazard”, “From Beyond”, “Defeat Remains”, leading up to a killer finale of “”Succubus”. There was always only going to be one encore track, the legendary “Corpsegrinder”, for which there is a return of the early euro-vocalists to provide some backing vocals and then it’s all over in a somewhat anticlimactic way, as the bass and drums have an impromptu jam that hints something further may happen but doesn’t.
So the cash-cow successfully and satisfyingly slaughtered yet again. Which grave to disturb next? Well, it’s already happening and the hallowed ground that is Carcass is being unearthed for festival dates next summer, now that they “have seen how much money is to be made from these reunion tours”. If I wasn’t such a necromantic I might make a stance against this crass commercial exploitation.
Rio’s, Leeds
18/11/07
My gig frenzy reaches another level, and I’m only half way though! A four hour drive through the sleet back from Cardiff (having used up all my daughters beginners luck in taking them to a glorious scraped draw for Wales), spectacular 12 police car and helicopter chase (not after me for a change) going the other way at Connah’s (another Irishman crying into his Guinness) Key, drop them off then two hours through the snow over the Pennines to Leeds, park up on the street, locate the relocated Rio’s, buy a drink, and the first band are on. Phew.
Rio’s in an industrial wasteland in Bradford used to be the best rock club in the North that I knew, and some best ever gigs have been seen there. In the last year though it surprisingly upped sticks to open up in a shopping centre in Leeds instead, although I know myself from good experience that this of the two cities is certainly renowned as a great place for gigs and a vibrant music scene now. Given its rather low key setting they’ve done a reasonable job in its set up, more compact and bijou than the previous version, but top quality sound and lights systems and still about 1000 capacity. Though the roof leaks. And there’s 50-60 here.
No great surprise necessarily, as this is yet anther resurrection of a death metal legend, following in the still-drying blood soaked wakes of Obituary, Bolt Thrower and (kind of) Brutal Truth of recent years. The odd thing about this though is that Massacre have always been dead, yet refusing to die. They are so old school that they were actually split and buried due to members leaving to form Death (regarded by some as the originators of the genre). It was only down to their legendary status amongst the vital tape trading network that formed this scene, listed as an influence by Napalm Death amongst others, that Earache (never one to miss an opportunity to flay a dead horse or rob a tomb) posthumously released their material with the “From Beyond” album. This classic is definitive death for me, and I was fortunate enough to work for the promoters on their early 90’s UK tour on the back of this, seeing them down at the Wulfrun Hall in Wolverhampton. Don’t recall that being particularly busy either, but their ultimately effective straightforward approach to extremity was a winner for me.
To start with we have a succession of three remarkably unremarkable Euro-metal bands. Firstly Suicidal Angels make their best efforts to kick off the brutality with some gruff speed metal riff mongering, a virtual homage to “Reign in Blood”, and lo and behold, as a finale, “Do you know Slayer?” and a cover of “Post Mortem”. Next Ashura, with their clanky nu-death, impressive collective hair-windmilling, but the largely monotone guttural grunts of the vocalist are a bit tiring after a while. Finally, Exterminator, with their proficient but dated death/thrash, rolling out a succession of clichés from the spooky organ at the vampires castle” intro to the mad, stary “evil eyes” resulting is an undercurrent of audience laughter running through their set. Especially as they, like the other two, run through the exact same extended list of thanks (this is the last night of the European tour) to all involved. As a special treat we then have a 10 man ensemble of these first 3 bands to do a cover of “Seek and Destroy” (surely that has been done to death, even by Metallica), joined by Kam Lee of Massacre, but quantity still doesn’t mean quality and I am left wondering how and why these bands got on this tour and whether anyone will ever hear of them again.
Kam Lee is back soon enough as Denial Fiend are his and fellow old stager bassist Terry Butler’s new project, that they are quite upfront about bringing back Massacre for the purpose of drawing attention to this. Taking it on face value then it is ok, a raw death style with punk riff feel at times, a somewhat cleaner sound, the drummer producing some intense double bass work. The lyrics are kept ultra basic, “Covered in blood” and “let the blood flow” summing up the variations on a theme, but Kam’s vocal delivery is as effortlessly brilliant as ever, the brutally deep growl or the demonic scream spot on. Speaking of effortless I was wondering if he’d had a stroke he was so inactive and awkwardly standing on stage, but he then explained he thought he’d cracked three ribs in some previous incident, so that would be why. They only play a short set, again acknowledging we’re all probably waiting for Massacre anyway, which can’t be argued with really. They finish though with the ultimate in obscure underground uberkvlt, a “cover” of Mantas “Legion of Doom”, Mantas being another very short lived project that featured Kam with Chuck and Rick from Death before that band, and BEFORE Massacre.
Next however is a band that I don’t mind contributing to that delay, especially as there have been some significant hold-ups in me getting to see them. Third time lucky for me to actually see the grind core/crust legends Extreme Noise Terror, as two attempts in recent years to tick them off the list have failed due to them bailing out of gigs at the last minute, much to general annoyance and damage to their reputation. Anyway, when they are finally on the stage I’m at last confident I’ll get to see them. They were a band that I’d been into since the school days listening to John Peel, favourites of his as they were near neighbours with them coming from Ipswich, and even broke in spectacular style into the wider public conscience with the collaboration with the KLF and a dead sheep at one years’ Brit Awards. They’ve kept stoically bumping along the underground, mainly playing in Europe, and foraying into a more death metal style at times, but their most recent release and tonight’s show definitely is back to their roots. Chaotic, wildly distorted, blast beats and hyper punk riffing is topped off by the raging, feral growls and screams of the dual vocals. (In between swigs of cider). There’s a variety of stuff played but to hear the older stuff like “False Profit” snarled out is a joy. A shame that after all this wait they even end up having to rush through their set, the Sunday hours could be a factor but then again I’d gladly have forsaken some of the earlier bands for more of this. My cry goes heeded as “the first song we ever wrote together in school”, “Bullshit propaganda” is played, resulting in a raw throat and stiff neck for me. This couldn’t finish even more satisfyingly as they blend it into “Carry on Screaming” (nothing to do with the film, rather addiction), and I do. Well worth the wait, I purchase the vital crust accessory, a patch!
And so to Massacre, the same confidence of expectation is there, they really can’t go wrong. There obviously is only the one album of material to air so starting of with the grand intro to opening track “Dawn of Eternity” is an obvious winner. The sound (after some early bass tech problems) is fantastic, perfect capture of their ultra-heavy straight forward riffing power. The volume seems to have been cranked to an extra level of impact as well. It is unspectacular by any sort of technical complexity standard but it’s precision and pummelling force is massive, similarities to the highly effective regular structure that Bolt Thrower also demonstrate. They have an extra guitarist, also (like Terry) from modern death metal “super-group” Six Feet Under, who provides some very tight solos, but the majority is just the thundering riffs, the atmospheric heavy breaks, all carried through by the bowels of hell growls. Naturally all the classics from their limited catalogue are rolled out, “Biohazard”, “From Beyond”, “Defeat Remains”, leading up to a killer finale of “”Succubus”. There was always only going to be one encore track, the legendary “Corpsegrinder”, for which there is a return of the early euro-vocalists to provide some backing vocals and then it’s all over in a somewhat anticlimactic way, as the bass and drums have an impromptu jam that hints something further may happen but doesn’t.
So the cash-cow successfully and satisfyingly slaughtered yet again. Which grave to disturb next? Well, it’s already happening and the hallowed ground that is Carcass is being unearthed for festival dates next summer, now that they “have seen how much money is to be made from these reunion tours”. If I wasn’t such a necromantic I might make a stance against this crass commercial exploitation.