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Review by Thomas Gates of Metal, Hultsfred, Sweden - August 2nd 2003See pictures from the festival » Hultsfred goes metal. August the 2:nd was the date for a new metal-event
on swedish ground in a little town called Hultsfred. Hultsfred is mostly
known for the Hultsfred Festival that has been holding on for nomerous
years and has a more variously line-up spanning from every music-genre
that attracts the youth of today. But this time it is an all metal one-day
festivity named Gates Of Metal. Started the morning by waking up wondering where the hell the noise was coming from, until i realised that it was my alarmclock buzzing with an evil sound, had almost forgotten that devilish sound since I was in the middle of my vacation. Got up at 8.30 am dead tired and poured down some coffe to wake up before my friend picked me up to take us in to Gothenburg to the bus that would take us to the Festival at 10.00 am. On the bus we were supposed to get an "exclusive heavy metal breakfast" and my first thought to that was that it had to be a shot of Jack Daniels, the ultimate Hard Rock beverage. Luckely enough I was wrong and calmed by finding out that the breakfast was actually rather nutritious with a piece of bread, yoghurt, lemonade and an apple. After we hit the road the video was turned on in the bus and some sarcastic fellow thought that Disney´s Ducktales should be suitable for a bus full of metalheads, finally after two episodes with cartoon adventures the tape was changed into one with musicvideos that someone had recorded from television, that someone should have his had checked since most of the videos was nu-metal, I really don´t think that Limp Bizkit and Korn is the right way to get yourself in the mood for a festival like Gates Of Metal. Finally when we arrived to Hultsfred we stepped into the festival area, and just a few steps in I spotted a stage and asumed with Sweden Rock Festival fresh in memory that the stage in front of me had to be the smallest one, started to look around and realized that I was standing in the middle of the whole place for the festival and the stage I was looking at was in fact the largest one, named Stage 1. Later on I noticed that it in fact was big enough and didn´t need to be larger when the ticket sales was limited to 5000 tickets and about 3500-4000 people showed up. Stage 2 was indoors with a small stage but with the floor leaning heavily towards the stage making it easy for the crowd to see the stage even if you should be standing in the back. Stage 3 was also with a roof in a pavilion with a stage just an inch bigger than the one in your local pub, that one should have been bigger in order for the band to get some room on stage. Well enough about that, lets carry on with the
reason why I was there in the first place, *************************************** Band: Iron Savior (Germany) Didn´t plan to see Iron Savior but instead of waiting in line before
they would let people in to see a delayed show with Norther I found it
better to watch them rather then to stand outside waiting. Iron Savior
that is mainly the child of producer Piet Sielck has been around a while
now and has released four albums and got most of their publicity in the
beginning mainly to the fact that Kai Hansen was a part of the band on
their first three albums. ***************************************
Norther is definitely a band that has the time ahead of them. Playing music similar to Children Of Bodom, yet not with the same complexity they surely have the skills to play and to write songs. The guys in the band are young and their inexperience shines through at many times and they sometimes look a bit insecure up on the stage, but if you give these guys a little time to grow I´m sure they have the capability to go very far. The show went along fine on the small stage and I really enjoyed listening to their melodic deathmetal and as the short concert was reaching its end they played their songs Blackhearted and Unleash Hell and got a part of the small audience to go wild. And to finish it all up they served us a real crowdpleaser in form of the old Europe song: The Final Countdown with growlingvocals that made most of the audience go wild as I felt a shiver running down my spine of wellbeeing. ***************************************
First
gig of the day for drummer Daniel Zimmerman
also found in Gamma Ray, as well as their touring keyboardist that I didn´t
catch the name of. Freedom Call did kind of "a day at the work"
performance, not to good and definetly not bad. And something that strikes
me is that singer and guitarist Chris Bay always looks so happy strutting
around on stage with a constant big smile, and I found myself smiling
the same way affected by this happines, what can you say, metal is fun. ***************************************
I have heard the latest record Wages Of Sin many many times so I know
how vocalist Angela Gossow sounds, I have
seen her on pictures so I know how she looks, but still I get completly
blown away when this beautiful blond woman starts to growl on stage, all
I can say is WOW. She kicks the ass out of most of the male vocalists
that sings with a growling voice.They starts the action with the song
Enemy Within and it is a killer performance from beginning to the end
of the show. It felt like the entire band was giving all they got on stage,
the Amott brothers was nailing the twinguitar parts and solos perfectly
while Sharlee D´Angelo furiously was
banging on his bass. Angela makes the perfect frontperson for a band constantly
getting the crowd going when she wasn´t strongly convincingly screaming
out the lyrics. It was a blend of both old and new songs but most of them
was taken from the Wages Of Sin album and when I thought it couldn´t
get any better it did, with the song Ravenous, magnificent is a word that
spontaneously comes to mind. ***************************************
Second
gig of the day for drummer Daniel Zimmerman
also found in Freedom Call, as well as their touring keyboardist that
I didn´t catch the name of.I think the skeletons thing was a really
good idea, loved to hear Rich & Famous and One With The World as well
as Armageddon. But however fun it was hearing the songs you don´t
normally hear, there was something missing, Kai´s singing wasn´t
on top and their performance didn´t feel as good as it should´ve
been. ***************************************
Lost Horizon seemed to be managing alright on stage without guitarist
and main songwriter Wojtek Lisicki, even if you could hear that there
was a guitar missing at some parts. ***************************************
You can always rely on Blind Guardian that they will deliver a quality show, and this time was no exception. I heard many voices after the show about how it was the worst show of the festival and that Blind Guardian was bad, but I seriously can´t understand that. The band played The Bard´s Song and The Lord Of The Rings two perfect sing-along crowd-pleasers and at the end of the Last Candle the audience more or less wouldn´t stop singing, that was a killer. Those are all good songs but I preferd to hear I´m Alive, Mirror Mirror and Valhalla, that´s when Blind guardian is at their best to my ears. This was not the best concert that I´ve seen with them but it was at least one step better than the one at Sweden Rock Festival. And one should think that when the band brings along a bassplayer with them on the road so Hansi Kürsch can concentrate more on the singing that he could move around a little more on stage and working the crowd better. ***************************************
Kreator is a thrash band that has been holding on for a very long time
and since I first heard the song People Of The Lie and later on the album
Renewal I have been a big fan of them. ***************************************
The show starts with the opening track Bless The Child from their latest
album Century Child, and after the intro Tarja
enters the stage and it feels like an angel has appeared in front of us,
dressed in white with an angelic voice she starts to sing and it feels
almost magical. ***************************************
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