Taake with Young and In the Way and Vattnet Viskar at Hard Luck Bar, Toronto, ON, Canada

                February 23^rd, 2016. A crowd of long haired trouble makers descend on the Hard Luck Bar in downtown Toronto for a night they will never forget as tonight is finally Taake’s first show ever in Toronto. A small bar up two flights of stairs into a small room filled with merch, tables, chairs and restless metalheads and luckily with our hotel being right across the road, as shitty of a hotel as it was, we didn’t have to withstand the brutal Canadian cold to long.

                After being let in and waiting about half an hour, Vattnet Viskar hit the stage. This band really caught my attention with their last album “Settler” and after missing them on their last tour with 1349, it was about time I had seen them. This band had all sorts of energy and their vocalist, Nicholas Thornbury, sounds even more Black Metal live than he does on record. Playing a set of songs both new and old, like “Yearn” and “Colony” from the newest album and “Apex” from their first album Vattnet Viskar really got the crowd ready for what is next to come, but man did they blow me away.

                Young and In the Way took the stage fairly quickly after Vattnet Viskar and what came next i really did not expect. Opening with “Betrayed By Light” which sounded to me a lot like Darkthrone, I was super excited to see what came next. How do I explain everything past this point? Well, Vocalist Kable Lyall began to remind me a lot of Niklas Kvarforth from the Swedish band Shining, which was one part awesome as I haven’t seen Shining yet and figure this is getting me ready for whenever they make their way to Toronto, but also one part terrifying. At some point during their third or fourth songs “We Are Nothing” or “Final Dose” I witnessed Lyall hang from the PA and watching it just waiting for the support to let go and it to fall on someone, I personally get kneed in the chest and I watched him boot a fan in the front row in the chest straight backwards into the pit that had opened up. Right, okay, this band is extreme and I'm standing back when Lyall is near me but past that, this is a lot of fun! After some more songs like “Oceans of Eternal Depression,” “Self Inflicted” and “Loved and Unwanted” we got to the end of the night with “Be My Blood.” Remember how i said he reminded me of Kvarforth? I was ready for him to slit is own writs or something here. Alas, nothing happened and everyone walked away leaving a lot of the crowd in awe and somewhat confused.

                We have to wait an hour and a bit after the end of Young and In the Way for various reasons, mainly being the pretty boys of Taake needed to finish their makeup. Finally after an insane wait time, the lights go down, the opening begins and out comes each and every member of Taake’s live band, except Hoest himself. Instruments start and out he comes followed by a roar from the crowd, this is why we were all here and this is what we were waiting for. Blasting through every note and being insanely friendly with the crowd Taake play a slew of songs from their 20+ year career including “Nordbundet,” “Orm” and “Myr” and eventually getting to the songs I know the best, as they cranked out the first three parts of “Hordalands Doedskvad.” GG Allen got a very fast paced tribute as Kable Lyall joined Taake on stage for a cover of “Die When You Die” and sooner than anyone would have liked, Taake closed their set with “Nattesid Ser Porten Vid, Part I.”

                All in all, everyone there seemed incredibly pleased with the night, there were fans of every band there and the musicians I had the chance to speak to afterwards were incredibly kind and seemed very thankful to everyone for coming out on a Tuesday night. No one was disappointed, especially not me, every band killed it and that’s all we can ask for as fans.

Vattnet Viskar performance 90/100

Young and In the Way performance 85/100

Taake performance 95/100

Overall experience 95/100

Concert Report: Killitorous, Erimha, The Apex and Ending Tyranny at the DSTRCT in Guelph, Ontario, Canada

                There’s something surprisingly unique about seeing a show that’s not in Toronto. There’s also something special about seeing a band that the last time you saw were playing the big Mayhem Festival stages and now they’re in your face. A nice Friday night in Guelph, Ontario, the university kids were out for a night of drinking when a bunch of Death Metal bands descended on the DSTRCT, a venue on the second floor of a bar that had some smooth jazz going. Upstairs was some “#BlackLivesMatter” party or something, and in the middle was Metal. Killitorous, Erimha, The Apex and Ending Tyranny were about to shake the support of this building.

                The night started a bit late as one of the bands had some troubles arriving at the venue, after a bit of extra waiting we were greeted by Ending Tyranny, who played their new album “Evolution of Deceit” and while it was there first time playing some of these songs, I’m sure another first happened for these guys, almost all the way through their second some someone collapsed! Without missing a beat the band finished, made sure the guy was okay and vocalist Callum Clark goes “what the hell, I missed it!” Some Tech Death goodness knocked this guy right on his ass, must have melted his brain a bit. Clark and the rest of Ending Tyranny, although being a rather small band, have a better stage presence than most bands that have been in the business for 20+ years. While introducing “Faceless Silhouette” Clark was able to joke about “since when did silhouettes have faces in the first place?” When the band came up to the end of their set they were thankful to the crowd and said goodnight.

                The crowd was rearing to go, after some wicked Tech Death that a lot of us didn’t expect to enjoy so much next on was The Apex. These guys were pretty cool having got the chance to talk to Tyson as both a journalist (read our interview) and a fan at the show plus their new album is killer and sounds even better live. The band opened fast and hard with “Contention: Chapter 2” the crowd was wild and ready to rock, showing The Apex what they were made the crowd was getting really into it. continuing with “Promise,” “Means To An End” and “Glass Walls” the band eventually hit “If Detroit Rivers Could Speak” getting the crowd nice and ready for what’s to come and closing out with “Contention: Chapter 1” this crowd was ready to kill and next up was going to be the perfect band to do it to.

                With their new album “Thesis Ov Warfare” released just weeks ago, Erimha were here to show everyone what they had to offer. Donning full corpse paint and performing barefoot the band opened with the first single from the new album “The First Law” and already the pits were going; this was the start of the destruction.  Having played Mayhem Fest in 2014 and toured with Mushroomhead, Erimha were pros at putting on a show, even though this was probably one of the smaller venues they had played in quite a while, they gave it their all. Blazing through their set with new songs the band introduced one from “Reign Through Immortality” although not “Verdict of the Soul” (which later, vocalist Gore told me they removed for a new song at this show specifically) the band roared into “Condemned To Desolation” and the pit grew to scary sizes for this small venue, nowhere was safe while the band played. “Fragmented Existence,” the song played to replace “Verdict of the Soul,” was (almost) worth still not having seen “Verdict” and after a few more songs, t was the end and onto the final band of the night.

                This is where things got real insane, using their own lights instead of the house lights and getting everything ready, Killitorous took the stage. This band has their own sense of humour that almost can’t be paralleled and it’s a crazy contrast from the sternness of Black Metal that Erimha has to offer. The band played a bunch of their hits like “’Til Death Do Us Party” and even inviting Ending Tyranny’s Callum Clark back to the stage for “Geore Castanza’s Father’s Son” the band made a ton of new fans with the level of silly Tech Death. At one point the band asked “does anyone like the movie Ace Ventura” which was greeted by a fan yelling “CANNIBAL CORPSE” and the band played 2 seconds of “Hammer Smashed Face” the band was coming up on the end of their set. Which I think a lot of people welcomed seeing as it was like 1:15am at this point. Playing through “No Not The Bees” and “It’s Not Stanley, It’s Stan Lee” the band made their way off the stage and the crowd was done. I’ve never seen a crowd so out of energy after a show, it just shows how much these bands has these people using.

                After the show I got to talk with the awesome dudes in The Apex and got some stuff signed by Erimha and finally got to meet all of them. The crowd made their way out looking thrilled to have experienced that level of awesomeness, everyone was making friends outside and all in the, the night was successful. All these bands are worth seeing live and if given the chance, I will see any and all of them again.