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Reviewed by Thomas
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Tourname: Cursed Earth Tour 2006
Special guest: Beyond Fear
City: Gothenburg, Sweden
Venue: Trädgårn
Date: 19 April 2006
Beyond Fear set-length: 45 min
Anthrax set-length: 1 min 40 sec...

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Beyond Fear

Beyond Fear is a new band that is fronted by Tim "Ripper" Owens who first got known for replacing Halford in legendary Judas Priest and that now also can be found in Iced Earth. It is traditional heavy metal that is delivered from this new band. Driving guitars, hard-hitting drums and a melodic sense and not least vocals that are simply great.

Even though people were still arriving and it was not exactly crowded at the front row, the band made a solid impression on me. And regarding the fact that their debut is not to be released for yet some weeks, the response they got has to be seen as fairly good. Sound-wise it was ok even if the bass sound got a bit of an overhand and the vocals seemed to drown in the massive wall of sound at times. Beyond Fear is to be seen as a band and not 'Tim Owens and band' even though he is the only known member of the band, but when they played Burn In Hell from his time in Judas Priest and Red Baron from Iced Earth you kind of think of Beyond Fear as his band anyway. Not to complain though since those two tracks came out really well from Beyond Fear.

The material from Beyond Fear's coming debut album worked really well live and when the voice from Ripper is as good as it is live you get captivated by the music. And I felt that I hope that this band will get the recognition that they deserve when the album comes because this was good. Their lead guitarist was playing inspired and skillfully and the drummer felt very dedicated to his task. And believe it or not, but Beyond Fear actually - as it turned out - outshone Anthrax by several miles. Keep on reading below.....

7 chalices of 10

SETLIST (might be slightly inaccurate)

And… You Will Die
Save Me
Words Of Wisdom
My Last Words
Your Time Has Come
The Human Race
Burn In Hell (Judas Priest)
Red Baron (Iced Earth)
Coming At You
I Don't Need This
Scream Machine

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Anthrax

Finally, after 16 years of waiting, Anthrax was back in Gothenburg. The last time it was as special guest to Iron Maiden and as a fourteen-year-old kid I didn't knew much about them, and did not pay them much attention back then, something that I regret today. And after seeing them in recent years at festivals I was psyched as hell to seem them again, indoors and headlining and all. And this was the re-union tour with the "classic" line-up, meaning Belladonna, Bello, Benante, Ian and Spitz, so there was no way this could go wrong. I spent the last weeks preparing for this concert by going through all of the old Anthrax albums since I wanted to be fully prepared for this historic happening that I was looking forward to so damn much.

The lights went down and the intro started to roll and as I heard the Blues Brothers clip they used as intro I thought to myself that this is going to be fucking great. The curtains went aside, the band entered the stage, and I felt excited as hell to see the guys going at it. The sound level was a bit low but I didn't pay that much attention to it. The government is preceding a witch-hunt against concert organisers in Sweden to prevent that the decibel level is set to high, and if so they will slam a fine to the promoter, so I just thought that perhaps they were measuring this concert. Anyway, the song had barely started and Dan Spitz is waving his arm to get the sound guy to increase the sound level in his monitor, but still it was so far so good.

'Disease, disease, spreading the disease' Belladonna sung, holy cow this started out great with the opening line from Among The Living. But then the shit hit the fan. The sound level dropped from low to lower, the microphone Belladonna used called it quits, and after trying to get the crowd to sing instead of him more things gave up and finally the band could do nothing but stop playing. And by now the show had went on for about 1 minute and 40 seconds. The band hung out at the back of the stage and waiting for the problem to get fixed and the sound guys ran around like crazy in the venue. After waiting for some minutes the band left the stage and we were told that the problem would be fixed in hopefully just a matter of minutes. Yeah right. After another while the curtains were closed again and people where running around with electrical cables, furiously looking for the problem, but nothing seemed to help. After more than an hour of waiting a voice from behind the curtains tells us that due to severe electrical problems the concert is cancelled.

I must say that almost expected a riot after the announcement but most people seemed to be taking it cool. Regarding myself, I just felt empty inside. These things happen and there is no point getting angry about it, although I have witnessed problems during concerts I have never been to one that has been cancelled after the band has entered the stage. So there was nothing to do but to go home with the tail between the legs after this anti-climax and start to wait until the next time they will return, and I will hold the band to their word on their homepage that they will return, but please try to come back a little sooner this time, I don't want to wait for another 16 years....

SETLIST:

Among The Living (not even half the song...)

-- chalices of 10

Related links:
www.anthrax.com
www.timripperowens.com