On Sunday, April 10th, 2016 on a snowy day in Toronto, the Decibel Magazine Tour descended upon our beloved venue, The Opera House. Abbath, High on Fire, Skeletonwitch and Tribulation made up the extreme metal tour of the year bringing a couple different firsts to North America, Skeletonwitch on tour with their new vocalist Adam Clemens and Abbath on tour for the first time.
At roughly 7pm, with a line of us
standing in the snow the doors finally opened and with very little time to
waste, Tribulation took the stage shortly after. Opening with “Strange Gateways
Beckon” this band is just as mysterious as they are fantastic, with guitarist Jonathon
Hultan very light on his feet, dancing and making his way around the stage seamlessly.
While the show continued the band continued to keep the audience captivated in
each and every line they had to shout out. Eventually, very quickly and after
only a few songs, “Holy Liberation” began and cranked through in what felt like
no time at all and Tribulation were done. The audience was mesmerized and even
though they were the opening band tonight, they packed in the venue and made
plenty of new fans already. No one was ready to see them leave, except those of
us who knew what was next.
After a
very short transition, Skeletonwitch took the stage with new vocalist Adam
Clemens, known best for his work with Wolvhammer, opening with “I Am of Death
(Hell Hath Arrived)” off the bands most recent album “Serpents Unleashed”.
Instantly, most previous fans of the band were drawn to the new incarnation of
the band, while not having quite the vocal range previous vocalist Chance
Garnette had, Clemens made up for with sheer destructive Black Metal force. The
band played a lot of songs off of “Serpents Unleashed” with a couple songs from
“Beyond the Permafrost” and “Forever Abomination” mixed in, but it was the new
songs that made everything special, you want to hear what the band will be
bringing soon. “Well of Despair” has been out for a month now, but the song
live is even more destructive, the fast paced Blackened Death sound Skeletonwitch
are known for got the crowd headbanging like some psychos. “Black Waters” was
the other new song shown off and personally sounded a bit more melodic and
chaotic instrumentally than anything previously done by the band. Not knowing
the song made it a bit hard to follow, but that’s fairly common with any song
you don’t know, but all in all it’s a song to look forward to hearing a studio
version of to really take in the madness. Eventually the band had to come to a close
with “Beneath Dead Leaves” and let the pit open one last time for Skeletonwitch
before their final goodbyes.
Due to
an interview taking place at the time, I was only able to catch the first
couple songs from High on Fire, but the interview was worth it, don’t worry
that will be up very soon. Opening with “The Black Plot,” I actually enjoyed
the band more this time than when I saw them on tour with Pallbearer. Maybe it
was just an off day for the band last time, but the new songs like “The Black
Plot” seemed more rehearsed and much tighter than before. The band brings a
traditional Heavy Metal destructive sound that a lot of people can enjoy,
although being the slightly out of place band on a bill filled mostly with
Black Metal. The other song I caught before having the leave the main area was “Carcosa”
which, although a good song and it may have just been my excitement, seemed to
take forever. High on Fire has a lot of energy tonight and it was a shame I had
to leave, but just you wait for the interview.
My
interview finished just as High On Fire were closing out, meaning when i got
back to the main area, the crowd was just thinning out a bit for the smokers to
take a quick break. Sneaking back up close, Abbath’s introduction began and
needless to say, the crowd went mad. After an epic introduction, the sound of
marching feet began and out came the band, everyone except Abbath himself, but
soon enough, just before the vocals of “To War!” started, the man of the hour
made his way in front of Toronto. All eyes were on the frontman as the band
cranked out songs, old and new, including “Winter Bane” from the first Abbath
album, “Warriors” from the band I and Immortal’s “Nebular Ravens Winter”. When
the band began “Ashes of the Damned” it was hard not to watch the frontman, if
you know Abbath, you know his signature Black Metal grunt, and this song is
full of them. While Black Metal is meant to sound evil, Abbath is hard to sake
to seriously, constantly making faces and striking poses for photos, you can’t
not be happy when seeing this band live. If you watch drummer Creature, you
might feel uneasy though, dawning a demon mask, whoever is behind the set knows
what’s going on. Creature will stare straight forward for 99% of the show,
barely needing to look at what part of the set his sticks are hitting and if
you watch it too long, you’ll start to get that “are you human?” feeling. When
the band broke into the Immortal track “Tyrants” you knew shit was going down,
the pit opened to its largest size and the crowd went wild, hair was everywhere
and people were being thrown around like there was no tomorrow. In the songs slow
section, roughly half way through, Abbath began to make poses and try to get
the crowd as loud as he possibly could, and it worked, before breaking back
into the headbanging madness. “Count the Dead” put a break between two more Immortal
songs, “One by One” and a song that personally, I was overly excited to finally
see, “Solarfall.” Abbath took every chance he got to take to the very front of
the stage during “Solarfall” and again, got the blood pumping. “Root of the
Mountain” followed with “All Shall Fall” afterwards. The band left the stage
and after a ton of cheering and chanting Abbath retook the stage, asking “so
you want some more?” and caused absolute chaos one last time with “In My
Kingdom Cold,” saying goodnight, promising the bands return and leaving the
stage.
Tribulation Performance: 85/100
Skeletonwitch Performance: 95/100
High On Fire Performance: 80/100
Abbath Performance: 95/100
Overall Experience: 90/100
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