Czwartek 16 Kwi 2009, 15:47
April 6 was the Cannibal Corpse show at Club Vegas . I really didn’t intend to go, it was more of a whim. Luckily a friend of mine wanted to go so I got off my ass and headed.
Waiting in line I realized a new pet peeve. Metal head kids who sing the lyrics to death metal songs, try to do the death metal growl and fail miserably. It just seems pathetic seeing a kid growling to himself to try to be cool.
I’ve never been to Club Vegas, driving past it always seemed like it would be a lame secondary venue if you couldn’t book a decent place, but I was completely wrong it’s a great medium sized venue and beats most of the other similarly sized venues for size layout and design. It think a lot of bands should make use of this place; the only drawback being that it’s usually a bar/club catering to a more intense biker/metalhead clientele. Definitely not a place a chirpy upbeat ska show should be held unless you want to see a bunch of ska kids get beaten (on second thought, maybe it wouldn’t be so bad…). It’s also a 21 and over venue so it seems like a bit more grown up venue, you won’t see high school kids getting picked up by their mommys after the show.
And this is probably only of interest to artists but the stage was large and deep, at least 15 feet deep, plenty of room to setup and move around while playing. Plus the venue is just a simple long rectangle with the stage at one end and pillars off to the sides. So you don’t get a pillar smack dab in the middle of the mosh pit or blocking your view from the back.
The first band was Obscura from Germany on their first US tour, and I must say they were off the hook! In my opinion they were the highlight of the night and made the $20 tickets completely worth it. They were pretty badass and I’m so glad I came to the show. They had a couple initial technical glitches but not bad enough to distract from the music and they still easily stole the show.
First off the bass player was amazing (Jeroen Paul Thesseling according to the last.fm bio), easily one of the best bassists I’ve seen. Besides just giving the bass an incredible workout he was totally into the music and you could tell he wasn’t just phoning in a performance for a midway stop on a tour, he was making a performance out of it. Although at first he kind of reminded me of the German guy in the IT Crowd when Moss takes a cooking course (I think it was the hair).
The lead singer/guitar (Steffen Kummerer) could definitely hold his own, even thought this is a death metal show there was a good balance of growling and actual singing making for good all around music and very accessible to people who aren’t avid DM listeners.
Lead guitar (Christian Muenzner) was amazing to watch him play, although he was totally engrossed in the music. It looked like nothing could faze him, if the roof collapsed all around us he’d probably keep playing with no knowledge of what was going on. Although with the technical difficulty of some of his playing I’m really not surprised, I’m impressed somebody can focus enough to play like that when surrounded by a screaming audience.
The drummer (Hannes Grossmann) was really good but unfortunately I couldn’t see him as well so see what he was doing. However being able to keep up with music like this is a challenge for any drummer, being able to make it sound good takes real skill.
Neuraxis was good too but didn’t appeal to me as much. It was mostly a break time for me to mingle. They tried to get a good moshpit going but people just didn’t get into it. Depressing since I had seen better moshes for the openers bands at the Suburban Legends gig a few days before.
The lead singer was really good and good at engaging the crowd but people just didn’t want to move. I don’t get why people “save their energy” for the last band. If the music is good and you go to a show to mosh, don’t hold back.
Next was The Faceless. The lead singer could growl a great show, and I saw the drummer practicing before the show. He was using double bass drums and manual pedals to get the speed for the songs, which is impressive considering the speed metal drummers use to get the highspeed bass beats.
It was cool by now that even the security is encouraging a mosh pit out of the audience (and they were starting to move a bit). Most shows the security seems to be keeping people from doing anything but stand there, here they were encouraging just about everything (except the few tussles the broke out and were stopped).
The way death metal singers growl is kind of impressive in a way, to go a few hours like that has got to be hard on the vocal chords. I saw the Lord of the Rings making and to do gollumn’s voice Andy Serkis had to drink special juice to keep up his voice, he should learn from death metal singers.
Cannibal Corpse was a stereotypical death metal, in good way. If you want to try out some new styles of music or go to an more aggressive show than you’re used to you should check them out… but wear black.
The head spins were intense, you have to build up some good neck muscles to whip your head around that fast without snapping your neck. The mosh pit really got moving and went insane, it was a great show!!! Cannibal Corpse is one of the main death metal bands for a reason, people may give them a hard time for being old or for having the same sound as they always have, but it reminds me the criticisms of AC/DC nowdays. People say they sound the way they used too like it’s a bad thing. I like bands the explore new ideas and new music but bands I love I love for a reason, and if they change to something else it’s interesting but I’m not going to Cannibal Corpse to not hear Cannibal Corpse. Know what I mean?
I wish I had brought more money for merchandise. I got a couple CDs but I wanted to get a cool Obscura Hoodie too. But I did get my copy of Obscura’s CD signed by all 4 members and got to talk with the band in between shows. I wish more bands spent more time hanging out where they can be engaged by fans rather than hiding in a tour bus all night and only popping out to play a set (looking at you Cannibal Corpse!).
All in all an excellent show! I’m so glad I made the decision to get out and see some music I don’t usually listen to as much.
CD’s purchased:
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Obscura – Cosmogenesis
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Cannibal Corpse - Evisceration Plague
