[All gig photos courtesy of Lara Vischi – Kreator / Arch Enemy / Shining + Marty Friedman]
[avatar user=”James” size=”50″ align=”left” /]I don’t mind a bit of thrash metal every now and again. I’m no huge thrash guy like Sean, but I enjoy a few bands’ material. Kreator are one of those few thrash bands that I never grow tired of listening to. When I heard they were playing, I figured I might as well go see them as I hadn’t seen them live before.
Due to a Christmas event finishing earlier than planned, I ended up at the venue at 3:30pm. This wasn’t a big issue, I was meeting Mosh at 4:20ish for the interview, which I would record. I was thankfully able to wait in the lobby and see some faces which I recognized move around. Jeff Loomis, Mike Amott, Mille and Sami from Kreator… I did get a little excited when I saw them.
Unfortunately, some issues caused sound-check to run late and overlap with the scheduled interview times. I then ended up with a giant poster, some questions and a brief idea of what to say when interview time came. Thankfully, everything worked out in the end and the interview with Jørgen went well. Thanks to Mosh for that/ throwing me in the deep end (only joking). [Thanks for taking the reins at a moment’s notice – interview went well! Mosh]
Onto the concert itself.
First up was the BlackJazz band Shining. Having never heard their music prior to the concert/soundcheck, I was looking forward to hearing them play. They reminded me a lot of the band Trioscapes, who play a slightly similar style of music. Marty Friedman then came on stage and blasted through the remainder of their 40-minute set with them. In short, they were very good and I look forward to seeing them again at the Devin Townsend gig in March.
Second of the night was Arch Enemy. Sporting new vocalist, Alissa White-Gluz and very recent addition Jeff Loomis, they blasted through songs that… I can’t comment on. This is due to interviewing Jørgen during their set. I’ll leave the Arch Enemy portion to Sean in his review. For the parts of their set that I did catch, they seemed very good and connected with the crowd very well.
Finally, it was Kreator’s moment to smash everyone’s eardrums. Opening with “The Patriarch” followed by “Violent Revolution” they provided a first class performance. I was in the back portion near the merch stands, and the overall sound quality was decent. There was the odd moment when it faltered, but this was quickly rectified.
Playing a mixture of new songs from Phantom Antichrist and older songs, they delivered a good set and caused many a huge pit. Sean will probably comment on them better, as he was in them! I was suffering from a massive sugar crash due to having consumed a whole bottle of Shloer in the hours before the concert. Having a face-full of German thrash metal rectified this and by about halfway through I was feeling better. I still didn’t go in the pit though, I figured it was best to stay put given I had recording gear and an interesting poster with me.
Finishing with a straight balls to the walls thrash duet of “Flag of Hate” and “Tormentor”, the outfit delivered an awesome show and probably won over a few new fans who may not have heard their music before.
In short, this concert was a worthy end to an awesome year. I hope to see Kreator come back to Glasgow soon, maybe bringing Sodom and Vader with them this time. Arch Enemy are a band I’ll probably never get into. I don’t know why, but for some reason I just can’t connect with the music. And Finally Shining are the band to look out for. They’re coming back in March as I stated earlier, and I’m rather looking forward to it.
