Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Photos: Aleš Podbrežnik
Location: Kempten / Big Box / Germany
Show date: April 10, 2012
Attendance: 2000
Ticket price: €35.00
Accept are awake, those old-guard heavy metallers of lumberjack German stock, a wildly rocket-boosted »Germanic-style« take on Judas Priest, and since their resurrection with »Blood Of The Nations« in 2010 they’re not slowing down. At the start of this April Accept launched a new studio album called »Stalingrad«. On it they plow and roar with undiminished fury. You could say the legends have never rattled the cage this hard and uncompromisingly in their long, rich saga of metal terror, which now stretches back a solid thirty years.
So this April Accept also put together a short promo tour of Europe. You could call it the first leg of a longer new worldwide »Stalingrad« tour, which kicked off in France (Paris) and, after a stretch of German dates, wrapped up in Russia (Moscow). The tour could have been given its full meaning if Accept had added the city of Volgograd (formerly Stalingrad) to the list of stops, but that’s nitpicking.
The collaboration between Andy Sneap and the band is well known. Andy Sneap is a huge fan of Accept’s music and practically offered himself to the band to produce the album »Blood Of the Nations«. The friendship between this excellent producer and the band grew. What’s more, the name Andy Sneap, guitarist of the classic N.W.O.B.H.M. true believers Hell, whom he joined in 2008 from his Sabbat, managed to secure not only a deal for the release of their debut, infamously aborted back in the eighties, which finally saw the light of day last year as the album »Human Remains« via Nuclear Blast Records, but also a spot for these legendary British metal forefathers as the support act on Accept’s new tour.
At half past six the entrance to the Big Box hall in Kempten was already a sea of black. The German crowd stays loyal and devoted to Accept. The view of the scene promised a lot, and it was clear it couldn’t be any other way! Once again we were witnesses to an unforgettable metal spectacle, with real old-school mastery.
At eight o’clock Hell are already on stage, presenting their classic repertoire in the manner known from the album »Human Remains«. Of the original members, three comrades remain in the lineup today: Kev Bower on guitar, Tim Bowler on drums and bassist Tony Speakman. The red lights, the look of the backdrop, and above all the crown of thorns on the singer’s head, plus the made-up rest of the crew, who beamed a truly chilling greeting from hell off the stage in deathly pallor, delivered, as expected, a proper mini-spectacle ahead of the main event. Tradition, mastery, experience! The musicians moved around the stage constantly, and singer David Bower (who joined the band in 2010) put on real stage theater. With his crown of thorns and goatee he actually recalls the antipode of Christ, the Lord of the Flies, one of the devil’s incarnations. The band used its 40 minutes triumphantly as a showcase. Not just of the album, but above all of the name Hell, which delighted in every way. To these fossil relics proudly stomping the metal proving ground once more, we wish as many successful gigs as possible and, most importantly, that they keep making up for their long, long years of dormancy in the future and soon release the follow-up to »Human Remains«. The sound during Hell’s set was excellent.
Nine o’clock. The stage suddenly looks vast. It’s adorned by Stefan Scxhwarzmann’s drums raised high on an extra riser, and to the left and right of them a series of gigantic speakers stacked in two rows, acting as a bulletproof wall for the dug-in Accept tank division about to roll out. In the background the head of a red lion appeared, its eyes lighting up wickedly more than once. Fog and strobes storm the stage. In front of the drums, on an extra platform, stand from left to right Heman Frank (guitar), Peter Baltes (bass) and Wolf Hofmann (guitar). The two-thousand-strong crowd greets them with a roar, and after the theatrical intro of Hellfire the boys scatter across the stage even more theatrically and each takes up their position. Vocalist Mark Tornillo joins the crew just before the first verse and everything’s set for a total switch-off! Rock-solid German metal staging, of course.
What always makes Accept so commanding is their exceptional stage dynamics and the feeling that everything they take on, they execute on stage with the untamed fury of genuine passion, charged with a surplus of testosterone-adrenaline haste and high-octane fuel. This incredible kinetic energy, stage agility and nimbleness from legends whose dewy years were lived long ago creates an atmosphere of proven metal hypnosis in which you’re a slave for a good two hours in no time!
Shoulder-to-shoulder posing, hair-flinging, synchronized guitar swinging, there’s plenty of all that during the show, and the Accept fortress literally doesn’t let you breathe in this devilish intensity. Germans are never as loud and wild as the temperamental people of the Mediterranean countries, yet during the show a fair bundle of seriously sauced heads happily staggered around, having stuck their noses a tad too deep into the alcohol fumes. After every song the crowd let out a huge roar that kept Accept in a state of highly sustained and upright erection. That nothing has changed about the German crowd’s great devotion to Accept was proven by the triple »saltatio mortis« of Restless And Wild, Breaker and Living For Tonite, iron-clad repertoire songs that in the opening stretch whipped the ecstatic crowd’s frenzied pack into a real mini-obsession. It didn’t let up for a moment, right up to the closing detonation set off by the last note of Accept music in Kempten that evening.
Between songs there’s plenty of room for the crew to stretch out with instrumental tomfoolery too. Here Wolf Hofmann takes the lead, a real athletic antipode to his virtuous Abraham, the gently worn stage silhouette of Herman Frank. It’s interesting that Hofmann takes on the bulk of the solo duties, which is a bit surprising given the equal standing of the two guitarists in the lineup.
Tornillo proved with his vocals that he’s lost a speck of reverence for Udo Dirkschneider’s boots. The new vocalist has further shaped his stage stature, built up his confidence and authoritative stamp, and as such looked on stage like a cast-in-metal link of the searing, sinister Accept crematorium! His screechy throatiness doesn’t have the charisma that Udo Dirkschneider’s vocally distinctive character has, but at every moment he worthily fills Udo’s boots, which means that thoughts of Dirkschneider are ultimately entirely superfluous at any given moment. Of the 21 songs, Accept put a full seven they recorded with Tornillo on vocals into the set. And they work with proven, full effect alongside the classic Accept catalog.
Of the songs from the excellent new album »Stalingrad«, the one that fires up best, or let me rather say “epic”, is above all the atmospheric Shadow Soldiers, a masterfully embellished anthemic tune, while the inclusion of the excellent »Blood Of The Nations« tracks Pandemic and Teuthonic Terror keeps all the credibility of that fine studio release. At the start of Hung, Drawn and Quartered, Accept allowed themselves their one and only bigger performance slip, when in the opening note Baltes and Hofmann didn’t quite get on the same page and played the intro harmony half a tone off. They quickly exchanged glances, stepped (with stern eye contact) right up close to each other and immediately locked onto the right tuning.
Although the sound worked excellently in the far part of the hall, from about 8 m back from the stage, the band had quite a few problems with the sound on stage. Mark Tornillo covered his ears several times to hear what he was singing, and at the end he simply ripped the in-ear monitors out of his ears.
The Accept show lasted exactly two hours, no more, no less. The gentlemen look the part and create the vibe of untamed youthful potency. Even though they carry the status of epic legends, they know no rust or other attacks of premature corrosion. So no sleeping for Accept! Only vigilance and a strict, forward-driving ride of the metal sermon. Accept return to European stages in the fall. Among other things, they’ve already confirmed a show at Zagreb’s Boogaloo club, which heralds a new big metal feast just a stone’s throw across the Slovenian border. If you’re a fan of the tradition of European-style metal, you absolutely must not miss Accept in Zagreb this time! Let’s hope, too, that Accept will also do a festival tour of Europe in 2013. The band’s charisma and power are exceptional, and the show in Kempten, Germany proved they display them with a sovereign bearing and a clear dictate that there’s a whole string of victorious years ahead of the legends, devoted to preaching the genuine spirit of the Teutonic school of metal craft!
Setlist
HELL:
1. Let Battle Commence
2. On Earth as It Is in Hell
3. Plague and Fyre
4. Blasphemy and the Master
5. The Quest
6. The Oppressors
7. Macbeth
8. Save Us From Those Who Would Save Us
ACCEPT:
1. Hellfire
2. Stalingrad
3. Restless and Wild
4. Living for Tonite
5. Breaker
6. Hung, Drawn and Quartered
7. Bucket Full of Hate
8. Monsterman
9. Shadow Soldiers
10. Guitar Solo (Wolf Hoffmann)
11. Neon Nights
12. Bulletproof
13. Losers and Winners
14. Aiming High
15. Princess of the Dawn
16. Up to the Limit
17. No Shelter
18. Pandemic
19. Fast as a Shark
—encore—
20. Metal Heart
21. Teutonic Terror
22. Balls to the Wall
23. Bound to Fail (taped outro)
Photo Gallery
