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THE ARCHIVES
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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
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FACE YOUR UNDERGROUND 2
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Hof Ter Lo - Antwerp (B)
February 11th 2006
http://www.fyu.be
Belgian webzine Face Your Underground organised a death metal festival for the second time. This year they booked the package of the Cryptopsy tour and added some Belgian bands + one killer French band. I was wondering how they were going to do that, so many bands in one day on one stage? The initial schedule I saw was to start at 1pm and each band would start one hour after the other. That hour would include change-overs, so that seemed a bit short to me for the bands higher on the bill. And apparently it was, the first couple of bands played a bit shorter so they were ahead of schedule and they had more space later on. There were several merchandise and CD stands as well as a hamburger/hot dog stand outside, so 
there was no need to get bored between bands at all. A fine day, only a pity that Hof Ter Lo doesn't seem to have air-conditioning or something, can't believe the air can get so thick in a fairly big venue. I ended up with a migraine at the end of the day, but oh well, I needed to see Cryptopsy so I had to stay and it was worth it ;)
THE SEVENTH kicked off the festival around 1pm with their nice, mostly midtempo death metal. Songs like "Only Blackness Radiates" and "Revenge Recoils" from their MCD are easy to headbang on. The band is back on track with a new bassplayer (Pé RIP) and there was a lot of support for the guys.
BODY OF CHRIST have been around since 1992 already and play very technical death metal with "digital" keys. Musically very cool, in the vein of Death. I liked songs like "The Solipsist" a lot, but the old "Overflow" had too much dominating keys I think. Unfortunately the stage presence left a lot to be desired. Singer/bassist Franky did a pretty good job, guitarist Bert did his best too to get in touch with the audience, but the other one, Frank, just stood there in one spot without moving as if he was in the rehearsal space. Not a good thing for a festival. The band didn't get nearly as much response as the opener and that was a pity, because pure musically they certainly deserved better.
AXAMENTA played atmospheric black/death metal that came across very well. The songs are technical and diverse and the stage presence was fine too - a couple of musicians headbanging a lot on stage is always a good thing ;) These Belgians left a good impression, they are a tight and enthusiastic band that managed to get the fans going with older and 
known songs, but also presented some new songs that were received well (didn't get any titles, sorry).
The last Belgian band that was added for this festival to the Domination Tour package, was SUHRIM. They are pretty popular, their extreme death metal with some doom passages got a lot of response and they got the first small moshpit going. This was the first gig in the new line-up (new guitarist and drummer) and it was a success for sure.
HURTLOCKER worked hard to get the people going, but it seemed they were too different from the rest. Their music is more extreme thrash/core and singer Grant Belcher, as a good American, used the word "fucking" in pretty much every sentence, which was funny, but also a bit over the top. Otherwise I personally liked the songs like "Goddamn Reflection" from the debut CD "Fear In A Handful Of Dust" a lot, being a thrash fan, but it seemed that the die hard death metal fans in the audience didn't get into it as much.
Well it was time for the extra band, a young French band, GOJIRA. You could feel the tension and anticipation in the air for many fans came for this band especially, and even though I had never heard their music, I started get curious as well. Needless to say the hall was pretty full when they came on stage and when they started to play they simply blew everyone away 
that had played before! Their diverse, technical death metal mixed with the almost industrial precision of bands like Strapping Young Lad or Meshuggah was executed so incredible powerful and tight, there was no way around it. Do you know that overwhelming, undescribable feeling when after some nice shows a band like Slayer or Machine Head enters the stage and blows everyone away with a power 100x as intense and tight than everything before? That's what happened here as well! My jaw just dropped and I couldn't believe how a band this young and I guess fairly unknown to the big masses, could be this tight, this professional, this powerful and this overwhelming! Even the drumsolo of Mario Duplantier was fascinating with its tribal sounds. His brother, singer/guitarist Joe Duplantier has a great voice and could also scream as if he's Devin Towsend's brother;) I didn't know the songs yet, so the only thing that specifically draw my attention was the intro with whale 
sounds that turned out to be the intro to "Flying Whales" from the new CD "From Mars To Sirius". The show was taped by Lowlife Media, so hopefully we're gonna see it back on a DVD soon. This was one hell of a revelation and no band would match this power, not even my beloved Cryptopsy! Gojira is going to be big, no doubt about that!
I pity the band that had to play after Gojira had just crushed everyone and everything in sight. The Polish corpse-painted black metal band VESANIA had that "honour". Of course they did do their best, but their fast, atmospheric black metal (with a fairly low voice of Orion who also plays
in Behemoth) couldn't generate a real good response.
Different it was for DEW-SCENTED from Germany. Leif Jensen's screaming performance as well as the band's vicious thrash can turn any hall upside down, although the hall wasn't as full as with Gojira anymore. The Gojira-aftermath I guess... This is perfect headbanging material though and this gig was one of my favorites from the festival. Quite a fest on itself with songs (mostly from "Impact" and the great "Issue IV") like "Bitter Conflict", the awesome "Turn To Ash", "Cities Of The Dead" (dedicated
to the crowd), "Never To Return", "One By One", "Bled Dry", "Soul Poison" and "Acts Of Rage" that caused a good moshpit.
ABORTED has become quite an established name in the death metal scene, they have toured with big names in the scene. These Belgians play the good old fashioned, very headbangable kind, so that showed on stage. There have been some line-up changes, one was a new bassplayer, Olivia (ex-Balrog) who also participated in the headbanging all the time. I didn't find their songs extremely special, but very solid and good for the metal soul. For the first time the hall got fuller again.
GRAVE is a cult band for many, but their mostly mid-tempo, doomy death metal couldn't hold my attention for very long. Songs I caught of these Swedes were "Turning Black" and "And Here I Die" of "Soulless" and "Obscure Infinity" of "Into The Grave".
Finally it was time for CRYPTOPSY. The intro provided the musical backdrop for a theatrical entrance. With his phenominal screeching there was no doubt about it: Lord Worm is back! Although he's not my favorite vocalist (I'm a newer fan), this is what all the old fans had been waiting for it seemed. So the audience loved it and he had to shake many hands in the front row after "We Bleed". The extremely technical death/grind of these Canadians is not of this earth, 
esp. the things that drummer Flo Mournier pulls off! It was all performed very tight and again my jaw dropped to the floor several times. But of course there is room for headbanging too, and also the musicians, esp. bassist Éric Langlois, proved that you don't have to stand still when playing very technical stuff (he was windmilling his very long hair all the time, awesome!). And Chris Donaldson (Mythosis) is the new man on the axe besides Alex Auburn.They played from all eras ("Abigor" of "Blasphemy Made Flesh", "Graves Of The Fathers" of "None So Vile", "We Bleed" of my favorite "...And Then You'll Beg"), but of course the emphasis was on the new album "Once Was Not" (a.o. "The Frantic Pace Of Dying"). In short... Cryptopsy ruled (although not even these legends could really touch the powerful sound Gojira had)! It was a pity that their set ended with a classical outro after a good hour already, way too short!
submitted by Marlies 04.03.2006
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