Beside the popular bigger festivals throughout Europe there are some smaller festivals that are worth visiting them. Be Prog! My Friend is one of the latter. A small festival that focuses on the more progressive side of the metal scene, which is held in Poble Espanyol in Barcelona, only a 15 minute walk of  the subway, although it went up and on such a hot day it was quite thirsty trip.

Day 1 :

The Andorrans of Persefone (***) had the task to open this festival. Their progressive death metal took us all by the throat. Very astonishing riffs and songs accompanied by some grunting and clean vocals. The yet not so crowded audience appreciated a lot of their performance. While I was not so familiar with their songs, I will for sure dig deeper in their albums. With Baroness (**) we were served a band that touches more the sludge and alternative metal as opposed to progressive metal. They sounded quite nice in the beginning but as the concert was going on it became a little bit too much of the same over and over, so the boredom started kicking in , and also the sun and some beers, so it was time to grab something to eat.

Now our belly was stuffed with some nice food it became time to tame the beast of the Swedish formation Pain Of Salvation (****). It became quite clear that a lot of the festival visitors came for this band, everyone was ready to watch them. And we have to say, it was quite an impressive gig. Very touching songs brought incredibly well to you by one of the most talented dudes out there: Daniel Gildenlow. Even when he brings us such emotionally loaded songs, they don’t forget to bring out the energy and the fun in the game which was quite obvious to see on stage.  While Ragnar Zolberg isn’t anymore a member of this band, the viking replacement, their old guitarist Johan Hallgren, was so energetic that the stage almost caught fire. With songs like Full Throttle Tribe, Reasons, Meaningless, Silent Gold, Inside Out and the finishing song The Passing Light Of Day, they took the crowd on quite an amazing ride. This was one of the most intense concerts I have ever seen.

Could A Perfect Circle (***) do better than the Swedish, we will found it out quite quickly. While the show was more impressive, I was wondering myself will it be more show than music. From the first notes Tool frontman Maynard James Keenan hypnotized the audience with his beautiful voice. Accompanied by some members of Eagles Of Death Metal and his partner crime Billy Howardel they build up a wall of sound. I have to say I heard a lot of Smashing Pumpkins in the music, especially in the guitar riffs. While Tool is more darker, A Perfect Circle is more melodic and touches base more with prog rock. The songs were brought perfectly and the guitar sound was astonishing, though personally I found it all a bit too much of the same. They could’ve brought a little bit more variation in the songs but the audience loved it, so who I am I to complain.

The festival also brought a small afterparty with the Finnish spacey black metal ensemble Oranssi Pazuzu (**). This was not my cup of tea but I can comprehend that some people like this psychedelic band that takes you on a spacey ride. Unfortunately we couldn’t see this band to the end as we had to catch the subway. Nevertheless a very satisfying day 1, up to day 2…