the Terça-feira 08 Março 2011, The Key Club

Belphegor (AUT)

The Key Club had a full concert night on Tuesday March 8th, 2011. The evening’s headliner was Deicide but several other bands played before them, including Belphegor. This review will cover Deicide and Belphegor’s concerts.

Arriving at the Key Club I saw some metal heads standing outside the venue, which meant: some band had just played and everybody was out having a break before the next band got up on stage.

When entering the venue it was easy to figure out who was playing next: behind the drum set a big flag with Belphegor’s logo and two of their banners on each side of the stage. Roadies were setting everything up. The concert was going to start soon.

When Belphegor entered and the “opening” song began, the musicians were facing the back of the stage and all the fans had their arms up. As soon as they started to play the first song it was obvious that everybody who was outside had already come back in. The moshpit was pretty big.

The band performed a short concert (only 6 songs). Most of the songs played were from their latest album “Blood Magick Necromance”: “In Blood - Devour This Sanctity”, “Angeli Mortis De Profundis”, “Impaled Upon the Tongue of Sathan” and “Rise to Fall and Fall to Rise”. The only older songs played were: “Hell's Ambassador” and “Lucifer Incestus”.

I don’t know if it was the fact that the band played most songs from only one album or maybe because their set list was too short, but I head the impression that their concert was “dragging” a little. There was not much interaction from the musicians; besides the lead singer’s “Helmuth” (he saluted the crowd a few times). Don’t get me wrong… all musicians were banging their heads really hard, but that was basically it.

All songs played had more or less the same intonation/ rhythm. The vocal lines didn’t vary much. Where were the screaming vocals? I couldn’t even recognize the growling vocals. Something seamed different than the songs that I’ve heard from their studio albums.

Yes… the drumming was amazing! But unfortunately, for me, that was it. I have seen Belphegor before and I remember liking their concert a lot at that time. Well… I am pretty sure that they are a good band to see live. Maybe my opinion is different than the fan’s (they did ask for more in the end, with no luck) or maybe we just saw them on a bad day.

Deicide

After Belphegor left, the fans started to pile up in front of the stage. Everybody was waiting for Deicide. When the musicians appeared, the lead singer Glen Benton started the concert by saying”: “Prepare to die!!”. Everybody went crazy! And for a good reason: they started the evening with “Homage for Satan”, “Dead by Down”, “Once Upon the Cross” and “Scars of the Crucifix”.

The quality of this band’s music is just unquestionable. The lead singer Glen Benton does his growling vocals and just shifts to screaming with no signs of effort! Just perfect! The drumming was awesome! Steve Asheim did a great job.

Both guitar players had great moments: we saw some pretty amazing solos from both of them. Some were done with the guitars facing the public and some others a little bit more traditionally. They had a thing in commune though: a lot of technique. Thank you Mr. Santolla and thank you Mr.Owen!!

The band played one song after the other with little interruptions. In one of the breaks, the lead singer says to the crowd: “Is good to see these faces again”.

The 18 songs setlist concert was satisfactory to any fan. Among them: “When Satan Rules his World”, “Death to Jesus”, “Desecration”, “Serpents of the Light”, “Kill the Christian” and “Sacrificial Suicide”.

The public was enjoying the show, the moshpit was wild, people were getting thrown out of the venue by security and lots of people were crowd surfing: signs that an amazing and brutal death metal concert is being held in LA.

When Deicide finished the concert was over. No drama, no encore. It was the first time I’ve seen them live and I can guarantee… it was a real pleasure!