Jilly’s Rockworld, Manchester.

The Domination Tour: - Cryptopsy (not reviewed) w/ Grave; Dew scented; Aborted; and Hurtlocker

With the doors opening at the slightly early time of 6:30, it’s actually about an hour before we hear the opening band, Chicago’s Hurtlocker (4), with new album ‘Fear In a Handful of Dust’.  Unfortunately, they are less than inspiring.  With half there riffs seemingly pilfered from the Slayer back-catalogue (one sounded torn straight from Angel of Death!!) the other half from any of a number of contemporary, thuggish and bruising hardcore bands currently doing the rounds, its left to frontman Grant Belcher to save the day.  He doesn’t. sounding almost out of breath from the first song, he is indistinguishable from the average metalcore/hardcore singer, and annoyingly chooses to inform us between practically every song that “we are Hurtlocker from Chicago.”  We already knew that, mate.

Next are Vesania (8), a band I knew little about before hand, but found myself pleasantly impressed.  Peddling an intriguing brand of Blackened Death metal, this Polish troupe (featuring members of scene leaders Behemoth and Vader) earn some new fans, supporting recent opus “God the Lux”.  Guitarist/vokillist Orion is the obvious centre of attention, though Daray’s pounding blast-driven drums are invaluable to the music’s momentum and power, whilst Siegmar’s keyboard-jinglings vary between slightly cheesy and sumptuously atmospheric.  A definite recommendation for any fans of Eastern European black/death metal.

 Everyone’s favourite Belgium gore-hounds Aborted (9) take to the stage with two new members, Seb (Genital Grinder/Balrog) and Olivia (ex-No Return/Balrog) replacing the departed Tace and Free.  Additionally, guitarist Steph is absent due to his girlfriend’s pregnancy, his place taken by Matty (Emeth).  Considering the changes, one could forgive Aborted for being a bit rusty.  But these Belgians aren’t gonna let that happen, they blaze onto the stage with startling ferocity, opening with ‘Dead Wreckoning’ from new splatter The Archaic Abattoir.  This band is on fire, and the crowd respond, tearing into each other in a brutal pit.  A magnificent performance by one of the best bands in the business.

Following are German Teutonic-thrash masters Dew Scented (7), fronted by the amiable and evidently excited Leif Jensen.  For the first few songs it seems only the old-timer thrash-heads are here for them, windmilling furiously in between swigs of beer.  But after a while the younger fans take over, with a small yet violent and energetic pit.  This is a band who clearly know what their doing, and enjoy it to the max.       

Swedish deathsters Grave (8) need little introduction, being one of the scenes’ longest running bands.  Ola Lingdren seems to be the only man in view, and his performance is a little lacklustre, though it is saved by the sheer quality of the material on offer.  The pit is again strangely localised stage-left, and lacks some of the energy of the previous two acts.  However, a stirring rendition of Rise finishes the set well, leaving fans eager to hear the forthcoming, half finished album.

Unfortunately, train times mean we have to miss Canadian technical-death legends Cryptopsy, with the return of their original vocalist, the lovingly titled Lord Worm, but already this gig has been worth the money.  Just about consolation enough.

Cannibal Corpse w/ Prostitute Disfigurement & Aeon

23^rd April, Music Box, Manchester

Bludgeoning Swedish deathsters Aeon open up proceedings with their brand of down-to-earth, blue collar brutal metal that works best in the live environment.  Death metal is often a genre that allows what is perhaps mediocre on cd, to become a powerful proposition live, and Aeon prove this theory tonight, surely gaining several new fans along the way.

Prostitute Disfigurement return to these shores once more, and bring with them a more dynamic, confident performance and several more fans than seen when supporting Deicide at the tail end of last year.  Devil horns are raised, heads are banged and pits are opened as the Dutch band ferociously displays the potent force they are becoming.   

And now to the return of the masters of brutal, gore-obsessed death metal- its Cannibal Corpse, seventeen years and ten studio albums old, out in support of vicious new platter “Kill”.  As one of the most consistent bands in the genre, the Corpse have made less of a return to form, more of a statement of sheer bloody-minded determination, blowing away the criticisms once all too easy to level against them.  Put simply- tonight they rock! The material is of immense quality, flawlessly played to a rabid and insane crowd, headbanging; beating each other up in the pit; and crowd surfing their asses off.  With a mixture of new material (‘The Time to Kill is Now’; ‘Five Nails Through the Neck’, ‘Make Them Suffer’) and old classics such as ‘Decency Defiled’ and ‘Hammer Smashed Face’, the Corpse are on top form.  Vocalist George “Corpsegrinder” Fisher, exhorts the crowd to greater acts of insanity, resulting in one crowd surfer knocking out the light system, leaving the band swathed in a sinister red glow, which only adds to the intense feel of this momentous gig.  Closing with the gloriously un-PC, Parent Group worrying ‘Stripped, Raped and Strangled’, Cannibal Corpse imprint in the minds of all present (if they didn’t know already) how simply immense they are with the sonic and visual equivalent of a jackhammer to the head!  Long live the Corpse!!!! 

Severe Torture @ Satan's Hollow

The first thought entering one’s head upon the first entrance to Satan’s Hollow is: what a fuckin’ immense looking place. The second is, what a shit place for a gig. The stage is a raised circle surrounded by metal rails, and the entire place is covered in pillars which make any pit-action pretty much impossible. However, the intricate designs all-over the walls and ceiling make up for that a bit by giving the place a great atmosphere not found in the sterile mundanity of the Music Box. Unannounced openers RETH do a mildly diverting job, but to be honest no-one’s really paying much attention to them, and the lads do little to grab any. Up next is Huddersfield thrasher’s EVILE, who’s old-school assault suffers from one main fault- they wear their influences so much on their sleeves that there was more chants of SLAYER!!! during the set than any other. Basically they sound like Slayer crossed with Metallica by way of Testament. If you want to pretend its still the 70’s and bullet belts are still all the rage, then you’ll like these. But just like their predecessors, they just don’t fit in or stand out at this type of gig. Shame, ’cos they played with a lot of energy and enthusiasm. The night finally kicks into life when Welsh death-metallers DESECRATION take the stage. Ollie Jones is a domineering presence on the tiny ’stage’, and bellows his way through a fine set, the highlight being without a doubt a simply vicious rendition of ’Bacterial Breakdown’. For the first time tonight, the majority of the audience seems to actually want to see who’s on stage, and by the time they leave, Desecration have prepared everyone for the bloodbath that is to follow. On the back of intruiging new album Fall of the Despised, Dutch bruisers SEVERE TORTURE come to bring brutality and blast beats to our ears. And joyous be the sound!!! Despite the new album, which shows a marked move away from the splatter-gore of old, the band take most of their set from its ferocious predecessor, Misanthropic Carnage. The crowd certainly don’t mind, and heads begin to bang insanely, hungry death-heads lapping up every moment. Closing with a one-two combo of the insanely brutal ‘Mutilation of the Flesh’ and the brooding instrumental outro to Fall f the Despised, of the same name, Severe Torture finish on a triumphant high, leaving punters begging for one more song.

Severe Torture gig, Manchester, Satan's Hollow

Sunday 1st April 2007, Cerebral Effusion, Septycal Gorge, Putrefy, Kastrated, Dawn of Chaos @ Satan’s Hollow, Manchester

Cerebral Effusion, Septycal Gorge, Putrefy, Kastrated, Dawn of Chaos @ Satan’s Hollow, Manchester

Dying Fetus w/ The Red Chord, Skinless & Cattle Decapitation- 23rd May @ Jilly’s Rockworld, Manchester

A late arrival means openers War From A Harlots Mouth and From A Second Storey Window fall under the radar, so it is left to CATTLE DECAPITATION to open proceedings. However, the militantly-vegan Californian’s bovine-grind is swamped in a murky sound, reducing it to an indistinct, weak mess that only partially improves as their set continues.
NY brutalists SKINLESS return with a new vocalist, Jason Keyser, who as usual enters the stage wearing a gas mask and then proceeds to stage-dive straight into the middle of the crowd, and a new album, Trample The Weak, Hurdle The Dead (Relapse), to once again batter our ear drums with their groove-drenched sonic carnage. Opening with a blistering rendition of ‘Overlord’, the band soon have the entire audience at their mercy, clearly giving tonight a much needed boot-up-the-ass. Songs such as ‘Crispy Kids’ and ‘Tampon Lollipops’ get the crowd headbangin’, and the only disappointment is the criminal lack of ‘Extermination of My Filthy Species.’ Always a band with a sense of humour, Skinless direct the crowd into not one but two versions of the ‘wall of death’, firstly the ‘tsunami of death’, where the crowd split back-to-front rather than right-to-left, and later the ‘Zombie Wall of Death’, where Keyser orders that they move “one step per beat.” Overall, it’s a stonking performance, and one that proves they should have been second only to the Fetus on this bill.
THE RED CHORD appear to be the reason for the presence of a fair few scene-kids tonight, and this is confirmed when they enter the stage and the scene-kids seem to multiply from nowhere. In between two of the world’s premier death-metal acts, The Red Chord’s schizophrenic-grind seems slightly out of place, and although those who came to see them lap it all up, they don’t seem to gain many new fans. The main reason for this has got to be the frankly downright annoying, way-OTT gangsta beatdowns that mark their newer material, and seem present in almost every song tonight. It is probably quite telling that the best song they played was the furious ‘Antman’ from their 2004 debut Fused Together in Revolving Doors. As such, the pace and tempo of the gig drops again after Skinless raised it up, obviously not helped by the fact it’s a Wednesday, and despite what’s to come, it never really picks up.
For over a decade now Dying Fetus have been pushing out their technical death-grind, and despite various line-up difficulties, have managed to establish themselves as one of the top names in extreme music. Their sixth album War of Attrition has been cited by many as a return to form, a whole four-years after its predecessor Stop at Nothing, and the band are here to prove that. Choice cuts from said new splatter such as ‘Homicidal Retribution’ and ‘Unadulterated Hatred’ stand-up well alongside the older material (‘Born in Sodom’, ‘Praise the Lord (Opium of the Masses)’, ‘Raped at the Altar’). One of the highlights is undoubtedly an awesome rendition of the classic ‘Kill Your Mother, Rape Your Dog’. Guitarists John Gallagher and Mike Kimball, and bassist Sean Beasley dominate the stage, shredding with unremitting fury, whilst new drummer Duane Timlin provides a solid blast of noise. Impressive as it is on CD, Dying Fetus’ technical virtuosity and blast/slam style needs to be seen live to be fully appreciated. Let’s hope this new line-up proves stable, and gives us a whole lot more of this brutality!!!

Abysmal Torment w/ Sanatorium, Ingested, Crepitation, Introrectalgestation @ Satan’s Hollow

Quite possibly the most brutal line-up to pulverise Manchester in a long while, expectations for this gig were high, especially on the back of Abysmal Torment’s stunning debut Epoch of Methodic Carnage and the awesome North-West Slam Fest split which included Crepitation and Ingested (alongside Burnley brutalists Kastrated).

<city><place>Hull’s up-and-cummers INTRORECTALGESTATION (apparently that means something to the extent of a foetus growing inside one’s arse) open proceedings with a fairly solid blast of brutal death. Considering they have been together less than a year, it’s pretty impressive, and promises of good things for this band. Expect them to become a strong part of the growing UKDM scene. 

CREPITATION are up next, and they turn up the heat with a heavy dose of brutal slamming groove and all out humour. Always a band that seem to never take themselves too seriously, they constantly joke with the crowd and take the piss out of each other, though this in no way means they slack on music. The tunes are as punishing yet catchy as they are on North-West Slam Fest. Even more impressive is that this is despite half the band being missing. The normal two-pronged vocal assault becomes a three-way, as Paul’the Gek’ Whitehead is joined by guest vocalists Chris (of Kastrated) and Ingested geetarist Sam Yates.

 INGESTED now stomp onto the stage with their chugging, guttural, Devourment-esque US-style brutal death. One must feel for drummer Lyn Jeffs, who plays for both Ingested and Crepitation, as he blasts through two consecutive sets with no sign of tiring. Like the previous band, Ingested wisely stick to the tracks from North-West.., which the crowd eagerly lap up, though new track ‘Anal Evisceration’ is given an airing to a rabid response. By now the crowd are going fucking wild, nearly every head is being banged to the point where it seems like there’s gonna be people in casualty with whiplash by the end. With work on a debut full-length underway, it is clear that the UKDM underground is alive and kicking the shit outta you.

After this English onslaught, all that now remains to be seen is whether our continental cousins can match up.

Slovakian veterans SANATORIUM are the first to step up to the challenge, and open with classic ‘Fetus Rape’. However, it seems the crowd is somewhat out of energy after the previous pulverisation, and Sanatorium don’t get quite the same reception. Only about half-way through the set do they manage to galvanise the crowd into more energetic head banging.

<country-region><place>Malta’s ABYSMAL TORMENT are one of the most talented young brutal death metal bands out there at the moment, and tonight they absolutely slay. Blasting through several tracks from their debut, with the addition of one or two from 2004’s MCD Incised Wound Suicide, they are an unstoppable torrent of blast beats, slams, and the excellent gargles and squeals of dual vocalists Nicky Farrugia and Gordon Formosa. The crowd explode once more, every ounce of energy furiously expended. As they close the set, the crowd beg for one more song, and Abysmal Torment comply with a repeat of ‘Befouled with Zest’. Fucking awesome.

Tonight, to put it simply, has been a brutal triumph, for the <country-region><place>UK scene and the European, showing that both can handle their own against the Yanks. Excellent stuff.