Photo Reports

Last summer, Finland’s up and comers Lost Society unleashed a very nu metal tinged album with ‘If The Sky Came Down’, and they’ve been touring Finland these past couple of weeks to promote that album in front of many sold out venues. Finally, it was time for Helsinki to rave to their music, and with them, they brought the metalcore youngsters of Balance Breach and alt-rockers Luna Kills for what turned into a showcase of what the future for Finland’s music scene looks like.

The (Helsinki) vampires took to the streets on last Friday night. A room that was practically empty suddenly filled with strange creatures wearing sunglasses and leather jackets to protect themselves from the light! The mythical and veteran Finnish band The 69 Eyes, leaded by Jyrki 69, come to Munich for another glorious night presenting their gothic rock or “goth ‘n’ roll” as they often call it. Opening the night happened by perhaps Europe’s most famous horror punk band, The Others.

The wait is over, after the Swedish Avatar‘s earlier tour was postponed. The moment came last week and provided the band’s biggest crowd in Munich.
The show that mixes music and circus was presented by Johannes Eckerström in German, which according to him is not the best, but it’s arguably better than the Swedish of everyone present in the beautiful venue of the Neue Theatherfabrik. He had time for everything, from climbing up on a side balcony to play the trombone and do tricks with balloons, also to fostigate the audience with violent and calmer songs performed on the piano. The Avatar’s new album “Dance Devil Dance” was released last month and the band’s return was a big one. Joining the party were the Americans Veil of Maya who practice a mixture of metalcore and djent and the Swiss Kassogtha who practice a death metal.

When a good friend band like Hexa Mera invites you to attend the release party of their new album (Methuselarity) to report it, you can only be honoured and accept the offer! (And be happy about it too!) A new album that has been worked hard on deserves an equal release party! To that end, Hexa Mera invited 3 friendly bands to assist them and warm up the audience to the max for their show! What immediately stands out is that the new album has the same familiar Hexa Mera sound that we look-expect-find with them! The new album certainly did not disappoint our reporter Annet when reviewing it,(https://www.grimmgent.com/albumreviews/hexa-mera-methuselarity-part-1/), and for us, live, it was already at least as good! If you haven’t heard it yet, you should definitely give it a listen as soon as possible!

Support acts were Royal Jake, Xeno and Destroy Humanity.

The reunion of two strong names in symphonic metal, gave birth to a joint tour called “The Epic Apocalypse Tour”. The Finnish Apocalyptica and the Dutch Epica were accompanied by the progressive metal of Wheel, also from Finland.

Thirty minutes were enough to make us believe that we want to see Wheel again for a little longer. We look forward to their return to showcase their new work to be released this autumn on InsideOutMusic. Superb performers James Lascelles (Vocals/Guitar), Santeri Saksala (Drums), Aki ‘Conan’ Virta (Bass) and Jussi Turunen (Lead Guitar) paraded aggressive and melodic sounds in a short time, the crowd seemed already familiar with the band’s name, showing up early for them.

Co-headliners on this tour, the Dutch band Epica transmit a joyful and sympathetic live performance, the beauty of Simone Simons leaves no one indifferent and combined with her extremely high vocal skills, the mezzo-soprano captivates everyone. A powerful performance showcasing the band’s many successes is welcomed with open arms by the band’s devoted fans.

In the middle of a dark atmosphere on stage, 3 cellists and a drummer take the stage, and this is how Apocalyptica initially presents themselves, who for two songs have returned to a more instrumental past, later joined by the vocalist Franky Perez. During the fantastic and energetic performance there was also a special moment when Simon Simons joined them on stage.

A dreamy night with fantastic and magical performers.

Finnish melodic death metal legends Insomnium are back with the epic new album ‘Anno 1696’ and had to celebrate this properly. So here we are: 2 completely sold out nights at the legendary rock club Tavastia in Helsinki where fans were gathering to get to enjoy some of the new tracks live for the very first time, together with some classics and fan favorites. With them, they brought the new doom collective The Abbey to get the already excited crowd in the right mood for a killer Insomnium show.

Death, doom, black metal and mayhem were the major themes of a nice Sunday evening in the March of 2023. That was the night when legends of Death Metal Cannibal Corpse came to town – to Stuttgart, the capital of Baden-Württemberg, to be precise. To complete the line-up, Stormruler (USA), Ingested (UK) and Dark Funeral (Sweden) were part of the massive Cannibal Corpse (USA) headlining spring tour all over Europe.  Astonishingly the venue wasn’t sold out but a crowd of approx 1200 black and death metal enthusiasts filled the venue quite well.

The start was made by Stormruler – usually a duo, that adds up additional guest musicians for their live gigs – and presented their Melodic Death Metal show to get the crowd going. They did this very successfully just to say so.

With a significant change in the style of music, Ingested entered the stage and were the big surprise of the night to me – wow! What a great show. Already in the early stage of their set, the wall of death was requested by singer and frontman Jason Evans. The audience wasn’t a bad sport and happily did as requested.

Next to come was Sweden’s Dark Funeral and the return to classic Black Metal. The theatrical posing and movements of their frontman, the costumes and a KISS-like make-up give the band their very own and unique character.

The temperature was rising, and as much was the audience tension for the headliners of the night: Cannibal Corpse. They delivered what they promise. They rocked the house down, mosh- and circle-pits everywhere – it was a wild night. The Corpsegrinder and his crew set the level to maximum voltage and kept the level up with a mixture of their classics and newer songs from their newest album ‘Violence Unimagined’ throughout the show.

Every Black or Death Metal fan in the Stuttgart area that missed that night will be nagging for a long time. But there are still some gigs to go, and not all shows are already sold-out. If you’re close – go and see yourself!

Kamelot are touring Europe to introduce us to their brand new (13th studio-) album “The Awakening”. We travelled to Lille, France, to take some photos and enjoy the show! 2 Details that caught our eye:

– Nice to see that they can again count on the collaboration of Melissa Bonny (Ad Infinitum).

– They know that the French are as patriotic as they are (USA) and so when they were gonna wave the flag, they were smart enough to choose the French one for this show, which did not go unnoticed.

The warm-up acts were well-chosen and in the right order too. First, League of Distortion brought in the positive vibe, then the more experienced Eleine got the crowd ready for the headliner, but at that point the Tunisian proggers of Myrath had yet to do their show. They also built up a bit by choosing the order of their songs perfectly, so everyone was in perfect mood to welcome the mighty Kamelot!

Enjoy the pictures!

It’s been 4 years since I saw the Indian band Bloodywood live for the first time. I confess that the performance at Wacken was a pleasant surprise, but I felt that the band lacked live experience or nervousness hurt the performance, the songs seemed ill-prepared to be performed in front of so many fans. After all this time and after a pandemic that made many people stay at home, it seems that Bloodywood prepared themselves very well and return to Europe with an inexhaustible force and energy, stoked to present their first album Rakshak live. This time they have completely convinced me, without any doubt about their talent, effort, dedication to be better.

In Munich the night was simply demolishing, leaving the audience with the feeling of wanting a bit more, which unfortunately wasn’t possible, probably due to the short report the band has. On stage one member of the band was missing, who was sick, but didn’t stop performing live, being up there, far away from everyone, playing his bass in an imposing way. I am thankful that I had the opportunity, even if I was informed at the last minute that I would be able to participate in this show, I knew I had to be there.

Opening the night were Lake Malice who are growing impressively and showed why they are considered one of the most exciting alternative metal bands in the UK. Alice is a real blast live, and the band come onstage to break everything from start to finish. Keep your eyes peeled for these gentlemen!

Ladies and Gentlemen, Tonight, 013 Poppodium is Avatar Country!

Due to traffic, followed by problems with the photo pass, we missed the first warm-up act Kassogtha, but we were just in time to see Veil of Maya! This band from Chicago got the crowd warmed up for headliner Avatar to come next! Even though it’s been since 2017 since they released their last full-length album ‘False Idol’, they released a handful of singles over the past 6 years!

A little later it’s time for Avatar! Ladies and gentlemen, tonight 013 Poppodium Tilburg is Avatar Country! The Swedish heavy metal band led by Johannes Eckerström takes to the stage with plenty of theater and plenty of costumes and make-up as usual. Frontman Johannes Eckerström’s enormous charisma is not only found on stage, but also on the balcony, among the audience where he performs a surprise act while introducing their latest album Dance Devil Dance!