HairX and Minoutauro at Kadilnica of Death in Orto bar (2019)

Location: Ljubljana / Orto bar / Slovenia
Date: Thursday, 17.01.2019

New year, new Kadilnica of Death. Orto bar Thursdays. Same as ever. This year, the middle Thursday of January was reserved for two bands from the Primorska end of the country: Goriška glam metal revivalists HairX, and a coastal international power metal outfit called Minotauro, which brings together Slovenian and Italian musicians.

 HairX were the first up on stage. The quintet is made up of Miha Polanec (vocals), David Gorkič (rhythm/lead guitar, backing vocals), Patrik Drole (rhythm/lead guitar, backing vocals), Tilen Jarc (bass) and Kristjan Čuk (drums), with a small tweak to the lineup: Tilen’s spot on stage was filled by his brother. The band played material from their studio debut “Animal” (2017), some brand-new stuff too, and tried to fire up the sparse crowd a bit more with covers of Roxette and Van Halen. Glam metal and sleaze are around here in Slovenia, of course, but they’re kind of just limping along. HairX are one of the few standard-bearers of that eighties musical phenomenon, and they’ve turned it into their own calling card. Look around Slovenia and the only ones who could keep them company are maybe Shotdown, Tomcat, Street Creeps, and then you’re already out of promising names (there used to be Hotty McKnotty, Wild Crew,.. but where they are now, only the devil knows). This kind of revivalism has been ruling for the last fifteen years, in full swing abroad, and HairX are really trying to channel a bit of the vocabulary of bands like Crazy Lixx, Reckless Love and H.E.A.T., while Hardcore Superstar and Crash Diet are already pushing off into sleaze waters…. The band showed plenty of drive and commitment, but there was still that void yawning between the crowd and the band on stage, a kind of passivity from the small audience, who hung back and clapped politely and that was it. It needed more madness. The band is solid. You could even say very solid, and they strive for perfection. Despite all the effort and the heart they showed, this time you could notice a few moments of sloppy playing (flubs), and the guitar sound was set up a bit poorly, so the two guitars sounded, sadly, less distinct. The band came across a little reserved, maybe stepping on stage with too much respect, but they’d surely have loosened up more with more support from a crowd that was painfully thin.

Compared to HairX, Minotauro belong to a completely different genre current, one that has been losing attention in recent years, since most of the new generation of metal fans has somehow shifted over to the more extreme branches, where growling instead of singing is almost mandatory. So Minotauro are looking above all for a breakthrough abroad, and among other places they play regularly in Germany, where they’re surely greeted by bigger crowds. Minotauro are Rudy Berginc (vocals), Roko Smajlagić (guitar), Nik Smajlagić (guitar), Enos Zuliani (bass), Ales Lavrič (keyboards) and Emanuele Petrucci (drums), and they’re sworn to power metal heavily beefed up with symphonic arrangements. Minotauro don’t write predictable power metal assaults; they like to complicate things a bit. It’s typical of the band to dive into some more complex rhythm within individual songs, which carry that epic, bombastic element. That’s nothing special in power metal, more like required content. The band is very experienced. They’ve been around since 2010, which isn’t exactly a super long time, but the individual members have plenty of mileage from earlier musical adventures. The skill and tight focus of the sextet are confirmed by two very high-quality releases, the debut “Master of the Sea” (2013) and its current successor “Apocalyptic Sense”, released in 2017, as well as by the collaboration with renowned names of the international heavy metal scene, who signed on as special guests on both albums. As expected, the band played a mixed setlist with songs from both records: Landless Soldier, All Seeing Eye, Never Loose Your Faith, The Day Of Redemption, Apocalyptic Sense, Master Of The Sea, The Taste Of Freedom, The Idol, Devil’s Sign, This Is What We Need, Braindigger and Hero. In between, they threw in Easy Livin’ (Uriah Heep) and Burn (Deep Purple). With the exception of Another Day, we heard almost the whole of the debut “Master Of The Sea”. The band is brilliantly in sync. Young Nik’s soloing takes your breath away, and the crossfire of solos between him and the seasoned Aleš Lavrič on keyboards works great, though it has to be said the keys were less audible in the mix, and especially hard to hear in the parts where Minotauro launched into riff-marching with both guitars, which is a shame, since Lavrič is otherwise superb at what he does. Nik Smajlagič once again confirmed that he’s the real discovery of guitar playing in Slovenia. Looking at the long run, his presence on the Slovenian scene means setting new standards for guitar playing, brought on by the arrival of a new generation of young Slovenian musicians in the world of metal. Compared to the gig experience at the end of November 2018 at MINK in Tolmin, Minotauro came across this time a touch more connected and coherent. In short, they delivered an even stronger live show, and Rudy in particular seemed even more relaxed and fired up, reminding us several times, especially in the high to highest registers, that he’s a truly superb vocalist. Even though Zuliani kept to the background, his Pero Defformero shirt stood out, and he’d probably win an Oscar for it if there were ever a category for concert shirt picks. That leaves our trusty Roko, who, amid the spiky riffs and solos, always quietly takes on the role of the “supervisor” who makes sure everything on stage is dialed in the way it should be, and of course the incredible drummer Emanuelle, who went especially berserk, flung himself around and gave himself a proper workout during the Deep Purple song Burn.

 An excellent performance, then. Sadly, this report too has to end with the observation that the night would have lived up to its mission even more intensely if more people had turned up at Orto bar and not just a good 30, among them three power metal enthusiasts from Jesenice, which deserves nothing but praise. We’ll definitely be seeing them again very soon at the upcoming Brainstorm and Mob Rules gig on 29.01.2019 at Orto bar! Anyway, it was a lovely, pleasant get-together with the promising and brave glam metallers HairX from Goriška and the excellent Minotauro.

author: Aleš Podbrežnik
photos: Aleš Podbrežnik