Photo Reports
The kings of weed metal Bongzilla brought the smoke with them to a packed house at Kuudes Linja in Helsinki, Finland. It had been a year since their last visit to the same venue, and these stoner legends from Wisconsin delivered their usual absolutely crushing wall of sound to a highly anticipating crowd. The night was opened by a Finnish black metal band Frigid Winter which delivered a grim performance full of eerie vocals and blast beats. Witness this night of smoky riffs from our pictures down below!
During the pandemic, Charlotte Wessels decided to lock herself in her home studio and write 1 new song a month. Her home studio is located in the basement and was therefore named ‘Six feet under’. As a result, she now has 2 new albums: ‘Tales from six feet under’ vol I & II.
It is a collection of songs that have nothing to do with each other. With those 2 CDs, she has now done some club shows in Holland. We all know Charlotte as the former frontwoman of Delain, and we immediately get what is familiar to us and what we came here for: her unique voice! The music we get to hear certainly does not disappoint, but those who came for metal are left hungry. We do get to hear some metal now and then, but the whole thing consists mainly of a very diverse palette of genres, more in the direction of pop music than metal.
Guest appearances were made by Elianne Anemaat (Cello), Zora Cock (lead singer of Blackbriar who did the support act, with whom she performed the song ‘Mary on a Cross’ (Ghost cover)) and surprisingly, George Oosthoek also dropped in to grunt on the song ‘Toxic’. Surprising because this was never shown at the other gigs of this tour: George himself was here as an audience guest, but Charlotte had asked him if he didn’t want to do that, which of course, as a good friend, he couldn’t refuse. They have worked together with Delain so many times in the past.
As a finale to the series of Dutch club shows, Charlotte was somewhat emotional when she received a standing ovation at the end of this one-and-a-half-hour performance.
Support act: Blackbriar.
It’s that time of the year again: The Finnish festival summer gets kicked off properly with the black metal festival Steelfest! The gathering of the wolves of the underground is easily a yearly homecoming for anyone who has a love for the extreme and obscure. And as always, the lineup is massive with an impressive list of 46 bands filled with cult bands, legends of the underground scene, and exclusive and rare performances.
After last year’s extended anniversary edition, they decided to permanently add an extra day to what used to be a 2-day celebration of the underground. 2 days into the fest, we got back to the festival ground as early as we could to catch as many bands as possible. Though by hanging around and party with Carpathian Forest the night before, we sadly rolled out of bed too late and missed out on Ruttokosmos, Vornat and Sotherion, luckily there was more than enough interesting stuff to come and to fulfill our need for extreme and underground music…
It’s that time of the year again: The Finnish festival summer gets kicked off properly with the black metal festival Steelfest! The gathering of the wolves of the underground is easily a yearly homecoming for anyone who has a love for the extreme and obscure. And as always, the lineup is massive with an impressive list of 46 bands filled with cult bands, legends of the underground scene, and exclusive and rare performances.
After last year’s extended anniversary edition, they decided to permanently add an extra day to what used to be a 2-day celebration of the underground. 2 days into the fest, we got back to the festival ground as early as we could to catch as many bands as possible. Though by hanging around and party with Carpathian Forest the night before, we sadly rolled out of bed too late and missed out on Ruttokosmos, Vornat and Sotherion, luckily there was more than enough interesting stuff to come and to fulfill our need for extreme and underground music…
We went to see Ghost’s concert at the Zénith Arena in Lille France. They are still touring the world with their album Imperia. Photogenic they certainly are, just too bad we were only allowed to take pictures during the first 3 songs (as usual), but that Tobias Forge was not wearing his cardinal robes during those songs. Otherwise, Tobias feels at home on stage and exudes a certain calm. His guitarists, in between flawlessly playing their riffs, take ample time to look into the camera. Ghost delivered a top-notch performance as usual! Ghost does not disappoint!
Support was provided by the Canadian band Spiritbox, who are on a roll everywhere. (All their shows in the UK in July are already sold out!). No wonder when you see the self-confidence of Courtney LaPlante. She takes the stage like she owns it!
Warm up act was Lucifer.
Persefone, whose name is derived from the Greek Persephone, Queen of the Underworld, Goddess of Spring, the dead, the underworld, grain, and nature were on stage tonight, supporting Australian band Ne Obliviscaris. They are no strangers to each other as they have worked together in the past: Persefone released the single “In Lak’ech” in 2018, featuring Tim Charles, singer and violinist of Ne Obliviscaris.
Both bands were on tour in Europe, promoting their latest albums (Persefone: Metanoia (2022) – Ne Obliviscaris: Exul (2023)) and we caught them when they landed at Trix club, Antwerp, to provide us with an evening of the best progressive death metal around!
The warming-up was provided by Asymmetric Universe. This band brings a kind of jazz/fusion with the aggressiveness of progressive metal.
It’s that time of the year again: The Finnish festival summer gets kicked off properly with the black metal festival Steelfest! The gathering of the wolves of the underground is easily a yearly homecoming for anyone who has a love for the extreme and obscure. And as always, the lineup is massive with an impressive list of 46 bands filled with cult bands, legends of the underground scene, and exclusive and rare performances.
After last year’s extended anniversary edition, they decided to permanently add an extra day to what used to be a 2-day celebration of the underground. So on ascension day, we already got to make the trip to Hyvinkää for a first day of exciting shows… On the outside stage it’s always interesting the variation of bands playing in full sunlight, going from bands that actually thrive on it to fully corpsepainted black metal bands that sometimes look a bit out of place. But once the sun starts to set a little bit, magic really starts to happen…
It’s that time of the year again: The Finnish festival summer gets kicked off properly with the black metal festival Steelfest! The gathering of the wolves of the underground is easily a yearly homecoming for anyone who has a love for the extreme and obscure. And as always, the lineup is massive with an impressive list of 46 bands filled with cult bands, legends of the underground scene, and exclusive and rare performances.
After last year’s extended anniversary edition, they decided to permanently add an extra day to what used to be a 2-day celebration of the underground. So on ascension day, we already got to make the trip to Hyvinkää for a first day of exciting shows… As usual, on the inside stage, you could find mostly acts that required a darker setting to create just right atmosphere and mood for their music to properly translate to a live setting.
Aesthetic Perfection has been around for well over 2 decades, and Daniel Graves, main man behind the project, has never really slowed down much. Because of the rising costs of touring, he has decided that this will be the very last headlining tour of Aesthetic Perfection. This could be the very last time we see him on stage with this project, unless he finds some supporting gig that is financially feasible. But since nothing is sure, we couldn’t let the possibly very last Aesthetic Perfection show on Finnish soil slip past us. So off we went to On The Rocks in Helsinki for an evening of industrial tunes!
After three years of postponing the goth legends, The Mission finally took over Tavastia, Helsinki on a Monday evening. The last time The Mission has graced the Finnish crowd with their melancholic music was exactly 33 years ago in 1990. So for some it’s been a long wait. Looking at the crowd, you could see many generations of goth music fans, from old school fans who have been there since the band’s inception to fans that weren’t even born when this band last visited Finland. Even when it was a Monday evening, Tavastia was packed to the brim of a gloomy looking crowd ready for a gothic rock ‘n’ roll experience. See it all from our pictures down below!
