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| E-Force |
With the phenomenal new album "The Wake" just released (review shortly) and the current tour coming to Hamburg soon, I'm in full Voivod mode these days. And what a great icing on the cake, that not only SnakeAwayChewyRocky are touring Europe, but Eric Forrest, who sang and played bass on "Negatron" and "Phobos" in the 1990s is on the road under his moniker E-Force, revisiting exactly those two albums!
But even though I was stoked with anticipation, two things bothered me before the concert:
1. The promotion was a hot mess. How do you work three mistakes into the headline of your announcement / concert ticket? It's the ex Voivod bassist, not "guitarrist", and that word has one R too much, unless you meant to go full denglisch. And the correct name of the support band is also on the tour flyer.
2. For years I had this original Voivod 1997 tour poster on my wall, which we had scrapped off a billboard directly after the concert back then. So why did I only think of bringing it with me to have it signed, when we were already on our way? That would have been so cool.
(Well, now that I've looked for it, I think I have disposed of it in a bigger tidying up a while ago anyway. But as I said: it bothered me before the concert, haha.)
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| Devariem |
The evening began with a local support band. Devariem from Lübeck brought a good bunch of people with them, who were only there for them and assumingly had no idea about the headliner. I guess that's ok, in the end a paying guest is a paying guest.
Musically they brought old school conservative comfort zone thrash metal. A little Bay Area here, a little "Teutonic Four" and Motörhead there. And at their best moments, when they went really fast and a but darker, it went into the direction of Thrash/Death bands like Protector. The main vocals were predominantely shouted in D.R.I. manner.
Musically they brought old school conservative comfort zone thrash metal. A little Bay Area here, a little "Teutonic Four" and Motörhead there. And at their best moments, when they went really fast and a but darker, it went into the direction of Thrash/Death bands like Protector. The main vocals were predominantely shouted in D.R.I. manner.
It was ok... as long as you didn't start to nitpick about the lack of control, precision or originality, which is all kind of very important to interest me in thrash metal. Especially in comparison to the following bands it was pretty mediocre, despite all that nostalgia.
I'm also bored by people in music discussions throwing the term "hipster" around as soon as something goes over their head. And Devariem premiered a new song called "Anti Hipster Squad". Since I'm a bearded guy who listens to far more jazz, advantgarde stuff and doom than traditional thrash, I guess that squad was supposed to tickle me? I don't know, man. I don't care. Just grow up, guys, ok?
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| Flaming Wrekage |
Flaming Wrekage from Australia were next and they did it right.
Maybe the vocals were a bit too exchangable, but on the other hand we were now presented with some actual songwriting including original riffs, fluent turns from trash metal to melodic mid-tempo death and high-speed blasts. Plus one other thing they were really good at: exciting harmonic double lead guitars.
No doubt: These guys know what they are doing and their show went by much faster than that of Devariem. Yet even though Flaming Wrekage definitely delivered, the night was of course going to end on a wole different level, which only very few thrash bands on this planet can rival...
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| E-Force |
Man, they didn't even play all my favorites like the "Phobos" title track, but boy, what Eric Forrest and his bandmates had in store for us was so fucking close to the real thing... no, let me rephrase that, since these songs are as much his as they are Away's and were Piggy's: This was the fucking real thing!
Unlike back in the days the music was performed with two guitars featuring one player who looked like Piggy and one who played Piggy's signature parts. Clever move. But seriously, it was a very good decision, because Voivod had that wall of sound philosophy on those records, which would probably allow you to play the tunes with six guitars and it would still be awesome.
The main attraction of E-Force besides the phantastic source material (and "Negatron" is not even my favorite Voivod album by far) is the man Eric Forrest himself.
Fuck, what an insane voice is that? That guy has some sick custom effect installed in his cyborg body. That particular voice colour somewhere between gargling distortion and almost throat singing is something no other singer I know pulls off, especially within his vocal range.
It's strange, brilliant, and while it's totally different from Snake's style it is also so fucking Voivod through and through.
Fuck, what an insane voice is that? That guy has some sick custom effect installed in his cyborg body. That particular voice colour somewhere between gargling distortion and almost throat singing is something no other singer I know pulls off, especially within his vocal range.
It's strange, brilliant, and while it's totally different from Snake's style it is also so fucking Voivod through and through.
Only one thing was not wholly Voivod, but at least it started with a V also. Just like last time twenty-fucking-one fucking fuck are we fucking old years ago,we got a crushing killer version of Venom's "In League With Satan".
What more can you wish for? Maybe a t-shirt in XXL, but that's it. Anaaaaark!
Devariem:
Flaming Wrekage:
E-Force:
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