Brutal Gangsters, Murder Bards, Antichrists and Anti-Politicians. What More Could You Want? (2010)

Venue: Menza pri koritu / Ljubljana / Slovenia
Concert date: 24.11.2010
Attendance: 300
Ticket price: €20 (reserved) / €23 (on the day)

A cold Wednesday evening and a heap of metalheads, most of them already slightly tipsy, were quite the attraction for passing Metelkova locals. And what was the attraction for the tipsy metalheads? Campaign For Musical Destruction Tour 2010, of course. The bill was made up of grind pioneers Napalm Death, brutal tech wizards Immolation, murder metallers Macabre and New Jersey gangsters Waking The Cadaver, a very promising up-and-comer on the death metal scene. Reason enough for a sold-out hall, right?

To catch the eager youngsters of Waking The Cadaver, we slowly strolled into the hall and took up our positions. There weren’t many people inside yet, since the band is still fairly unknown. Everyone figured it was just one more failed attempt at overchewed deathcore. They were wrong. When vocalist Don Campan stepped onto the stage and grabbed the mic, it was clear he had nothing to do with any kind of core. The music did consist of plenty of Suicide Silence breakdowns, but that didn’t bother us. One funny detail worth mentioning: whenever Don wanted the crowd to make some noise when announcing the other bands, only a handful of hands went up, and all you could hear was the growl of the drunk, everyone-knows-him “brutal” Sandi. To get the proper effect, Don repeated this routine more than once, just to snap the crowd out of its trance. On the first try he branded them the worst crowd of the whole tour, but he soon changed his mind around the fourth or fifth attempt, when a bigger crowd finally yelled back and threw up their “devil horns”. Despite the delay and limited time, WTC stretched their set out a bit and pumped us full of extra adrenaline for the bands to come. At the end they bowed, thanked everyone and praised the crowd for holding its own.

After a very long wait while the gear was set up and the stage prepared for Macabre, the time finally came and the intro music kicked in, which honestly scared us a little. Over the creepy soundtrack, vocalist and guitarist Lance Lencioni started talking and then screaming: ”Zodiac”, which has been the opening track and the intro to the show for a few years now. And when Macabre started to “burn”, so did the crowd, which swelled quickly from 20 to 150. Lance screamed, the crowd sang along. Lance sang, the crowd screamed. A great bridge of teamwork was built between the audience and Macabre. Another fun fact: despite the very complicated music, Macabre are only three members. Even more interesting is the headset mic Lance uses. He says it gives him more freedom to move and makes playing guitar easier. Since the sound in the hall was a muddy, indistinct mess, the crowd blamed Lance’s mic, figuring it sucks in all the noise from around it. They were wrong. Up to that point everything had been working as it should. We can only blame the hall’s acoustics, the PA and the sound guys. Still, the guys gave it their all and played us a medley of tour hits. As Lance put it: ”We prepared 30 songs for the tour, but each night we pick a different 9”. Sadly even those 9 flew by and it was time for them to say goodbye. The good news: they announced they might be back as early as April 2011, with support from their buddies in General Surgery.

After the show came a look at the merch table and a trip outside for some fresh air. Stepping out of the hall, we spotted the bassist of the Macabre trio and chatted with him for a bit. But time flies when you’re chatting, and we had to head back in, because a new band was about to start.

We made it inside a minute late, and New York’s Immolation were already unleashing their fury on stage. This time the hall was packed from end to end. People went wild, booze was sloshing everywhere, and the smell of stinky, sweaty metalheads in leather was crawling up our noses. But all of that was easy to ignore next to Immolation’s technical playing, or rather their onslaught. The friendly guy Ross Dolan turns into a real monster on stage the moment he grabs his bass and steps up to the mic. The other musicians don’t lag far behind him either. Each plays their instrument as if they’d been born with it. Apparently an ear for music and skill really are hereditary. Brutalization, growling, screaming, flailing arms and metal headbanging filled the show for an hour, which is how long it lasted. At the end Ross just added that it’s always a pleasure and an honor to play for a Slovenian crowd. Now the crowd just has to make a bit more of an effort and drink a little less before and during the show.

Next up were the fathers of grind, Napalm Death. This time there were slightly fewer people than for Immolation. But no problem. Even better. At least it was easier to breathe. Anyway… the guys came on stage and started grinding without a second thought. As Napalm fans know, their vocalist Mark ”Barney” Greenway is bursting with energy and can’t stand still on stage for even a second. A pillar on stage, which was anything but convenient, gave him trouble. He wrapped his mic cable around it several times, and when he wanted to swing his arm somewhere, the shortened cable stopped him. It was no obstacle, though, and it gave onlookers a good laugh. What pierced our ears and made us deaf was the high-pitched scream of guitarist Mitch Harris. What this man can do with his voice is barely believable. Few people can pull out such a high vocal without sounding heavy metal or glammy. The highlight of the night was the announcement of a song that’s actually a cover of hardcore punks Dead Kennedys. Barney bellowed: ”Nazi Punks…!” and the crowd finished: ”…Fuck Off!”. Besides that one, they played other old hits too. Over the whole show you could hear only 3 songs from the new album. Anyone who planned to go and then changed their mind has reason to be sorry. So the guys hammered our heads with their anti-political message for a little over an hour. But since every good thing ends too fast, sadly this Napalm Death set did too.

All’s well that ends well. A sold-out show and excellent bands guaranteed a really good atmosphere. Now we can only wait and hope that another ultra-good lineup like this one shows up again. Despite the bad sound in the venue, we had a blast and headed home with smiles on our faces and heads full of beautiful/brutal memories. Even the ones who got way too wasted slowly made their way home. How they got there doesn’t matter. What matters is that they got there. And as the late owner of the American football club New England Patriots, Victor Kiam, would say: ”Even if you fall flat on your face, you’re still moving forward”.

photos: Tjaša Saje

Setlist

NAPALM DEATH: 1. Downbeat Clique 2. Hung 3. Continuing War On Stupidity 4. Next On The List 5. When All Is Said And Done 6. If The Truth Be Known 7. Lucid Fairytale 8. Social Sterility 9. On The Brink Of Extinction 10. Mentally Murdered 11. The World Keeps Turning 12. Pride Assassin 13. Conform (Siege) 14. Politicians (Raw Power) 15. Greed Killing 16. Scum 17. Control 18. M.A.D 19. You Suffer 20. Nazi Punks Fuck Off —encore— 21. Suffer The Children 22. Instinct Of Survival IMMOLATION: 1. The Purge 2. Father, You’re Not a Father 3. Once Ordained 4. Majesty and Decay 5. Passion Kill 6. World Agony 7. Immolation 8. Close to a World Below 9. Power and Shame MACABRE: 1. Zodiac 2. Temple Of Bones 3. You’re Dying To Be With Me 4. Nero’s Inferno 5. The Ice Man 6. Scrub A Dub Dub 7. Burk And Hare 8. Hitchhiker 9. Vampire Of Dusseldorf

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