Ville Valo, Neon Noir, a Round of HIM Classics, and Pure Ecstasy in the Heart of Ljubljana (2024)
Performing: Ville Valo (support: Zetra)
Date: Thursday, 11 April 2024
Location: Ljubljana / Cvetličarna / Slovenia
Ville Valo is a Finnish singer-songwriter best known as the central figure of iconic Finnish gothic metal and rock outfit HIM! Early last year Ville released his debut solo album “Neon Noir”. And while HIM have been off the scene for seven years now, the inconsolable grief of the band’s devotees has at least been partially eased by the fact that Ville has simply chosen to go it alone musically! In terms of musical direction too, “Neon Noir” delivers more than enough of what HIM fans love about the band’s sound that they quickly claimed it as their own.
Demand for the show was enormous and Cvetličarna had sold out well before the legendary vocalist even set foot in Ljubljana. Fans came from every corner of the region — Croatia especially! Everyone knew the setlist would balance material from the debut “Neon Noir” with the biggest HIM anthems.
At 8 PM, British shoegaze gothic metal duo Zetra opened the evening and delivered a seriously convincing half-hour set with their hypnotic, ultra-musical approach. Swirling guitars that fill every inch of space, stripped-back rhythms, and contrasting vocal interplay. The band released their album “Sacrifice” at the end of November 2023. Even the opening title track, with its brooding backdrop, bittersweet vocal melodies, and spare guitar lines, made an immediate impression.
But Cvetličarna only really started bursting at the seams once Zetra left the stage. That’s when the venue began filling to its absolute last corner with unstoppable momentum! Thankfully the balcony was open too, which once again proved to be an incredibly handy refuge whenever you needed to get from one end of the room to the other. All in all, a good 1,300 heads packed in tight as sardines. Between half eight and nine in the evening the crew carefully set the stage for the headline act.
Ville and his backing band — two guitarists, a bassist, and a drummer — hit the stage at exactly 9 PM and opened the night with the infectious original Echolocate Your Love. An euphoric crowd carried him on their wings through an hour and a half of music, and the stunning atmosphere never let up for even a split second. It’s hard for anything to go wrong when you lace the setlist with a constant stream of HIM hits and zigzag through the show’s programme at will. The crowd sustained an incredible level of ecstasy throughout. Naturally, the screaming from the female contingent repeatedly drowned out everything else — which is simply part of the charm of catching an artist like Ville Valo live. The guy, wearing a beanie hat held in place only by his ears on an otherwise pretty solid frame, appeared to expend surprisingly little physical energy on stage. The setlist did the work for him. Moving mostly like a chansonnier — a few steps left and right from his central spot — he rarely addressed the crowd directly, yet was in a visibly great mood throughout. He flashed the audience plenty of smiles, and right after the first HIM moment of the night with Killing Loneliness he received a proper bouquet from one of his fans (a few bras also landed on stage as the night went on).
The performance was strictly professional. Not a single slip. The bass lines occasionally pushed a bit hard against the overall sound mix, and it was clear that programmed samples and keyboards were running in the background. But Ville was vocally completely in command from start to finish. There he stood — and in front of him, a sea of smartphones held aloft by delighted fans. In a way he barely had to try. The crowd did it all themselves. The new material from “Neon Noir” slots perfectly alongside the HIM classics, which is a massive bonus that pours fuel on the fire and pushes the whole concert experience toward the truly sensational. A blazing, bristling, massive wall of sound from both guitars; crisp, dance-ready yet thunderous snare hits; a solid bass bed; and a charismatic vocal on top — all of it built on a tapestry of minimalism that unleashes dark gothic bombast through a succession of insanely catchy chorus hooks. That’s exactly what the crowd came for. And they got every penny’s worth.
The main set wrapped up in a flash — after one hour and six minutes. That was followed by a 25-minute encore, which Ville and the band opened in proper HIM fashion with the classic Gone With the Sin. Even in this stretch, the high-voltage atmosphere inside Cvetličarna refused to ease up one bit. Then came Buried Alive by Love and the closing HIM classic When Love and Death Embrace for a grand total of 20 songs in a show where absolutely nothing went wrong.
Recreating that singular musical energy — that musical vibration, with a clear added note of nostalgia and the raw emotion of a crowd that deeply misses HIM on stage — rests on the fascinating and powerfully effective chemistry between the audience and the vocalist and his band. Everything in one. All in one place.
Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Photos: Aleš Podbrežnik
Ville Valo setlist:
1. Echolocate Your Love
2. Killing Loneliness (orig. HIM)
3. Run Away From the Sun
4. Right Here in My Arms (orig. HIM)
5. Loveletting
6. Rip Out the Wings of a Butterfly (orig. HIM)
7. Salute the Sanguine
8. The Kiss of Dawn (orig. HIM)
9. Heartful of Ghosts
10. Join Me in Death (orig. HIM)
11. Neon Noir
12. The Funeral of Hearts (orig. HIM)
13. The Foreverlost
14. Poison Girl (orig. HIM)
15. Saturnine Saturnalia
—encore—
16. Gone With the Sin (orig. HIM)
17. In Trenodia
18. Buried Alive by Love (orig. HIM)
19. Baby Lacrimarium
20. When Love and Death Embrace (orig. HIM)
