|
THE ARCHIVES
|
Morrigan's Pit has closed down as of November 2006. The site and its articles will stay online as an archive until September at least, but probably longer.
The Archives
2002-2006
» CD REVIEWS
» INTERVIEWS
» LIVE REVIEWS
» SPECIALS
|
|
|
|
|
BANG YOUR HEAD 2005
|
Messegelände, Balingen (D)
June 24th-25th 2005
http://www.bang-your-head.de
This year's BYH was the 10th anniversary, so they invited bands that had already been on the bill before. For us it was a quite different festival as well, for a number of reasons. First of all I have to apologize that this is such a half-assed review: due to some back problems I wasn't able to stay at the festival the whole time, I had to go back to our hotel early both days. I saw my personal favorites (however on day 1 just part of each gig), but I missed the bigger bands.
Since we couldn't travel earlier than Thursday night (ruling out the option to camp close to the campsite), we managed to get a hotelroom in Hechingen-Stein with the possibility of joining a group of friends for transportation to Balingen (eternal thanks to Theo!!!!) and that certainly changed our "Balingen-feeling". Where that used to be pumping air in the airbed while drinking the first beer, right after arrival on the campground, now it meant a good hotel bed and most importantly, a good shower!!!
That brings me to the next point... we were extra happy with the hotel when at Friday night / Saturday morning 1am all hell broke loose. After an extremely hot day (36°C/ 97°F), one of the heaviest thunderstorms that many had ever seen (so we heard people say afterwards) raged over the Swabian hills! The festival- and campsites were immediately flooded (30-50 cm/12-20 inches!), many tents collapsed or were blown or swept away (also some big merchandise tents on the festival area!), many lost their tents and 500 people were evacuated and spent the night at a sports hall. TV news mentioned 40 people with light injuries only, I had heard of one more serious injury - still, luckily no one got killed. The mixing table on stage got wet and had to be replaced, there was probably some more damage, but the technical crew worked very hard to get it all fixed, to make day 2 possible with some delay. Hats off to them!
FRIDAY
We were still waiting in line to get in when MORGANA LEFAY started the gig with some very loud (firework-)bangs. Once we were in, we saw how people were eager to see this awesome Swedish band again after a long time. After some legal struggles they're now back with the full name (it had been Lefay for a while) and a new album: "Grand Materia". There was a pretty big and very enthusiastic crowd already and the band put on a powerful show. Chulle's unique, strong and emotional voice is the only voice that comes close to Jon Oliva's and gave me goosebumps the whole time! New songs like "Hollow" and "I Roam" went down really well and with the classic "Maleficium" the fans were loudly singing along and clapping their hands. No wonder that the crowd was calling out for an encore, to me that means these Swedes were on this bill way too early.
The Canadians of EXCITER presented their bass-driven ultra heavy metal through songs like "Violence & Force", "Violator", "Long Live The Loud", "Pounding Metal" and of course one of metal's most classic songs ever, "Heavy Metal Maniac"! Singer Jacques Belanger gives the old songs a somewhat different feel, since his voice is a 
lot better than the old singer/drummer Dan Beehler's. Definitely a cool show, but not as successful as Morgana Lefay's.
KAMELOT is replacing Virgin Steele, but they are musically not at all my cup of tea. Roy Khan's great voice is a joy to listen to though! He was supported by a female singer, Heather Shockley, on some songs, at least the opener "Center Of The Universe". Some of the songs I heard were "Soul Society" from the new album "The Black Halo" and "Edge Of Paradise" from "Epica".
KROKUS I had also seen at last year's Rock Hard Festival and I was surprised how strong they still are. This Swiss band has been around since 1974 (!) and their AC/DC like rock is pretty ageless. It's not the same without Fernando von Arb who left recently, but the band's still going strong. Hits like "Long Stick Goes Boom", "Fire", the Guess Who cover "American Woman" and the way too apposite 
"Heat Strokes" were received really well.
I wasn't able to see a lot of DESTRUCTION, but since they opened with my favorite song "Curse The Gods"  (including the mighty intro, which still is one of my favorites intros ever) I was already happy :) I stayed until after "Nailed To The Cross". Afterwards I
heard that, besides the Mad Butcher and some girls, Destruction was joined on stage by Doro, Johan of Amon Amarth and Chulle of Morgana Lefay for "The Alliance Of Hellhoundz". I'm sorry I missed that!
The Swedes of AMON AMARTH were next and it was a bit odd to see the Northern vikings with too pale, half-naked bodies in the Swabian heat ;) Of course Johan Hegg is always a very impressive frontman, physically as well as vocally, and the whole band is headbanging a lot. I don't know many of their songs, but I heard "Bloodshed", the titlesong of the latest album "Fate of Norns" and I could leave satisfied after my favorite song "Victorious March"!
Next in line was Germany's first lady in metal, DORO 
. I don't really listen to her albums much (I was an old Warlock fan though), but I always enjoy her live shows. She's a great frontwoman with a great personality and a unique and powerful voice. She spent most of the time on the catwalk and at one point the last part of the catwalk went up a few metres, with Doro and bass player Nick Douglas on it. As usual she started with "Earthshaker Rock" and "I Rule The Ruins", followed by songs like "Live To Win", "True As Steel", "Hellraiser" and Judas Priest cover "Breaking The Law". My back ache was getting worse, Nico and I both were floored by the heat and the rest of the bands weren't so important to us, so we left at that point. While leaving the festival site we still heard her announce Chris Caffery who would join her for "All We Are".
That was the last of what we saw on day 1. Saving some energy for day 2 was more important to us than the four remaining bands. They all have some cool songs, but we had seen them several times in the past years. From what our friends told us, GAMMA RAY didn't do as well as what we saw last year at Rock Hard, maybe because they had some technical problems. All the better were SAXON, those British veterans always put up a good show. Of course they have a big collection of classic metal songs to draw from, like "747 (Strangers In The Night)" (with Mikkey Dee of Motörhead joining!), "Strong Arm Of The Law", "Motorcycle Man", "Wheels Of Steel" and "Denim And Leather". About MOTÖRHEAD I heard different opinions. Some said that Lemmy wasn't at his best and that they expected a bit more out of the band's 30th anniversary year. We enjoyed a great shower and a good meal at the hotel instead and for the first time we were truly wondering if we'd been getting too old for this shit after all. The heat had probably gone to our heads ;)
SATURDAY
During the night that thunderstorm I told you about in the intro wiped away many tents and damaged some stuff at the festival site. After a few hours delay we were let in and the bands started around 12.30 I believe. They let everyone play, but just 3-4 songs until they caught up. I thought that was a great idea, only if they had stretched it out a bit more, the headliners would have to compromise a bit too, which would've been much fairer. Still, it's better than cancelling bands alltogether!
I found DEMON very boring at Wacken some years ago, and they didn't do much for me now either, sorry. Only tune I caught was "Standing On The Edge". I heard they also played "Night Of The Demon" and "Don't Break The Circle" that many will know from Blind Guardian's cover version.
VICIOUS RUMORS kicked ass as usual! Although I don't own a lot of their albums, they're one of my favorite bands to see 
live. This morning Geoff Thorpe and his gang fired 4 of their "greatest hits" at us, and singer Brian Connor was once again incredible!! They started with "Don't Wait For Me" and all the time I was looking if the Brainstorm guys would jump on stage, since they covered that song once haha! Of course that didn't happen ;) After 3 more songs ("On The Edge", "Abandoned" and one song I didn't know), they threw some merch into the crowd and esp. the recently re-joined Larry Howe seemed incredibly happy throwing his drumsticks at the enthusiastic crowd from the end of the catwalk :)
NASTY SAVAGE I had never seen before and I've never been a real big fan, but it was pretty cool! I didn't think Nasty Ronny looked all that nasty in his shorts, open shirt and flip-flops, and I never liked his singing much, but I have to admit I was impressed after all. I love the fairly new (2004) song "Psycho Psycho"; "XXX" and "Metal Knights" took me back to the 80's :) I didn't see Ronny smashing a TV on stage in this short show, but I heard he did do that the night before at the warm-up gig.
As always JAG PANZER were one of the highlights! Awesome US metal with one of the best metal singers in the world, Harry "Tyrant" 
Concklin. When Harry came on stage he shook Nico's hand (Nico was in the photopit) and went on the catwalk, guitarists Chris Broderick and Mark Briody also used the catwalk frequently! The respons was great, there were a lot of fists in the air. Harry even took off a shirt and threw it in the audience. Only three songs, damn short but damn sweet!
setlist Jag Panzer:
The Mission
Black
Iron Eagle
The last time TANKARD played here, they were all wearing pj's :) Now they're just in their usual clothes, but one thing has changed: Gerre lost a lot of weight! With a lot of (renewed) energy he ran up and down the stage and the catwalk, firing up the crowd with the songs and having them sing along. The set starts with the strong "Rectifier" and the classic "Chemical Invasion". Gerre referred to the thunderstorm when he said that there luckily were no people killed, what a stupid death that would've been. It was the introduction to a song about "the only way to die": "Die With A Beer In Your Hand". On request of 
the fanclub they played "Freibier". Someone in the crowd yelled for "Smoke On The Water", "noooo" Gerre said, "that's not ours, you're mistaken!" ;) He thanked the organisation for letting all bands play and got to play an extra song, "Empty Tankard".
setlist Tankard:
Rectifier
Chemical Invasion
Die With A Beer In Your Hand
Freibier
Empty Tankard
Then one of my very favorite bands, NEVERMORE! What can I say that I haven't already said so many times. Awesome band, awesome performance, whether it's Warrel Dane's incredible and unique vocals, Jeff Loomis' and Steve Smyth's guitarsolos and riffing or the powerful rhythm section of Van Williams and Jim Sheppard. Together they create this unique music that enchants me over and over again, and so it once again happened in Balingen. They started with "Enemies Of Reality" and "The River Dragon Has Come", and then it was time to really get ecstatic for me, because they played my very favorite song "The Heart Collector". Such emotion! A new thunderstorm was heading towards the festival area, but Nevermore was almost at the end of their mini set anyway. Warrel asked the audience to go apeshit with 
the next song ("you know which one, don't you?") and to start a moshpit. So they ended with "Sound Of Silence" with a small moshpit in front of the stage. Too short, but "The Heart Collector" makes up for soooo much :) Warrel stays on the catwalk to (I assume) promote safe sex by throwing some condoms in the crowd ;)
setlist Nevermore:
Enemies Of Reality
The River Dragon Has Come
The Heart Collector
Sound Of Silence
The thunderstorm is coming closer, but we stuck around for a moment because the BYH crew came on the catwalk for an announcement. The end of the catwalk rose in the air again, and boss Horst Odermatt asked his girlfriend to marry him! She said yes, the catwalk-part went down and the two "wedding witnesses" (similar to the best man thing), Dee Snider and Sebastian Bach came on stage. They spoke and sang to the cheering audience for a moment and off they all went. It was said that all was prepared for a ceremony, the mayor was even there, so I guess they are married by now ;)
We went to the back just in time for the thunderstorm, but this one was very short luckily. Still enough to get pretty wet when I decided to flee a few metres from underneath a parasol into the big tent! Nico, who went to make pics of Axel Rudi Pell came back soaking wet (luckily his camera was ok) and we decided to call it quits. I already wanted to go, because I knew my back troubles wouldn't enable me to stick around long enough to see Dio and Twisted Sister, and the rest I didn't care for (except Candlemass a bit). And not to complain, I did see my favorite bands, and the headliners I would've liked to have seen, I had already seen at previous festivals in the last few years. Nico was curious about the special guest and was in doubt, but since it was either join me or stay very late to get a ride back with our friends, he decided to come back to the hotel with me.
Reactions to AXEL RUDI PELL were varied, SEBASTIAN BACH did his best-of-Skidrow-plus-some-solo-stuff show again, but this time with a pretty killer band, featuring Metal Mike Chlasciak and Bobby Jarzombek (a.o. Halford) and bass monster Steve DiGiorgio! CANDLEMASS repeated their killer gig from 2002, but I don't know if he came up with sentences like the legendary "Bang das fucking Kopf" again ;) They've got a lot of classic stuff to draw from like "Mirror, Mirror", "Solitude" or "At The Gallow's Pole", but also played new songs like "Black Dwarf" (opener), "Assassins Of The Light" and "Copernicus".
Our friends also informed us that the first surprise was 
HANOI ROCKS and they didn't go down very well. People even threw plastic bottles and cups at Michael Monroe and his band! The rumor mill had been overly active, so the expectations had been way too high. It was more of an extra though, the real surprise was MIKE TRAMP'S WHITE LION. Nothing I would've needed to see either, but they came across well, I heard.
DIO was again divine, but regretted he couldn't play any more of his many classics, when they did put two big solos in the set that nobody seemed to have wanted (or rather, everyone would've preferred two extra songs!).
And TWISTED SISTER was again awesome I heard, and that didn't surprise me. This year they played the whole "Stay Hungry" album, which resulted in less of the other big hits that people would've rather heard. Still, this gig was about good times, and good times the tired fans got!
Still sorry I had to miss it, but I don't mean to complain.
Our weekend turned out to be a bit of festival and a bit of vacation, overall it was still a pretty good weekend despite the heat - I'm sure this edition will go down in history as the hottest BYH ever! And despite the problems after the storm, it was a successfull 10th anniversary and the crew also decided not to let the festival die and go for round 11 in 2006!
Thanks to Monique Verspaget for the additional pics!!
submitted by Marlies 20.07.2005
|
|
|
|
|
