SKYFORGER, SKALDIC CURSE, INFESTATION, NECROSADISTIC GOAT TORTURE, LIVORES MORTIS AND SALUTE
This group’s future is so bright their drummer was wearing shades the whole evening. If this lot were an after shave it would be Old Spice mixed with engine oil, stinking of diesel, going out on the pull and waking up in the gutter. Salute missed their calling, the Bristolians should have been around in the 90s and would have no doubt been snapped up by a label like Osmose and disbanded after the singer died tragically choking on his own vomit. Their songs are all about having fun with little in the way of pretension, a bit like getting hold of a dirty whore, telling her to do her worst and hanging on for dear life and enjoying the ride. Above The Law was a crusty riot complete with chunks, making me want to throw up in my pint glass and drink it down again. Finishing on a number with a distinct Frostian spew, I had certainly enjoyed my first live encounter with this lot and could sum them up in one word “filthy”.
The band are Livores Mortis from the Czech Republic and an unknown origin to most of us here. They had nice candles and an impressive backdrop on the stage but it was quickly evident that there was something missing here, namely a bassist, drummer and keyboard player. Yes a singer and two guitarists were present with everything else sampled. Musically they confused a fair bit as they clearly walked between separate styles and it just didn’t gel for me. The vocalist had a nasty venomous delivery that would have gone down a treat with any band playing the Extreme Obscene festival but the evil keyboards just didn’t work alongside the brutality rendering it as unintelligible as the group’s logo. In fact they made me want to think of songs such as Arctic Ice as Arctic Ice Cream Van! Not wanting to be completely negative the singer did impress and when they stomped into a militaristic Laibachian anthem I was beginning to enjoy this more and taking a guess at their name translating to Liver Death the drink was certainly enhancing the listening pleasure here.
Not through lack of trying but till this moment I have managed to keep missing Necrosadistic Goat Torture. As penance slap my butt and call me Heidi as they are getting 2 live reviews and a demo one over the next couple of weeks. They had the most drunken elements of the audience (ram)med down the front for their thrashtastic assault and belching into Nekrolog had a shambling pogo kicking off. It has to be said that singer Goatthroat Taleka Schmidt could certainly give the likes of Angela Gossow a run for her money, the lady sounds like she gargles broken glass for breakfast and regurgitates it for lunch. I was slightly drawn to comparing them to Holy Moses which I can assure you is very good in my book and I really enjoyed the exuberance of this performance. By the time The Day Gods Die was nailed out headbanging was compulsory and the words thrash till death seemed more than appropriate. The band owes me a beer as I spilt most of mine in the process, great stuff.
I used to see Infestation at least once a month and watched them rise through the ranks with their brutal swipe at old school Floridian sounding death metal. All was going well before singer Dave ended up at her majesties pleasure, kind of scuppering their plans for world domination. Now 6 years later they are back and it has to be said sounding exactly the same as where they left off with Dave having gathered new band members around him to continue with their “evil, evil” assault. They now have (shock horror) a bassist but still are looking for a second guitarist, that didn’t stop them sounding like an uncompromising killing machine. With guitar and bass distorted hellacious in the mix this shredded like razors cutting through flesh and was far from pleasant. The frontman looks not dissimilar to a younger House Of 1000 corpses Otis, which when you think of it is a rather scary proposition to complement the music with. Basically this pretty much separated the men from the boys. Old songs like Necrospawn were certainly resurrected from the depths and exuded an air of dread as they set about battering us senseless. This is a band you certainly haven’t heard the last of.
This was the first gig in a long time from Skaldic Curse. They have expanded their line up recruiting Paul Scanlan ex Akercocke as well as releasing the festering morass that is Pathogen on Forgotten Wisdom Productions. Singer Woundz has a nasty set of lungs on him that is for sure and musically this lot are artisans of an incredibly ferocious and dark black metal craft. I neither got song titles nor even felt of them as particularly relevant, this was a display where the atmosphere and bleakness reigned supreme as you were immersed into trance like assaults of utter nihilistic despondency. A vortex of sound akin to a football mob going on the rampage, hurt eardrums and no doubt unsettled many who were present here. Guitars were thick and arcane reminding at times of Killing Joke at their very darkest Vocals had a cadaverous intent behind them and rattled like blood was choking in the gullet as a psychedelic tinge complemented the death throws of what could well have still been the first number. The dense sound took in aspects of the elite forces in black metal but with a very original slant, this was as uniquely abstracted as anything from the likes of Xasthur or Blut Aus Nord and this Contagious Psychic Misery deserves to be spread to the masses like cancer.
After the somewhat grim assaults of the previous two bands we really needed something to cheer us up and put us back in the party mood and Skyforger were just the band for the job. The idea of a Latvian Folk/Pagan metal band may well have you scratching your head and thinking “what the?” but believe you me it works very well and the band played a stormer of a set to an absolutely packed venue. I would have thought of the group as being a bit on the obscure side but it was absolutely rammed in here and it was as though the clans had been gathered from all corners of the globe to witness the show. It was an interesting visual spectacle as well with all manner of instruments coming out the woodwork including things I sure as hell can’t name and am sure using words like bagpipes and strange glowing washboards is far from correct so I am cheating and using the groups own description of “folk instruments.” Subsequent research has determined the washboard is in fact a kokle, an 11-string Latvian hybrid of harp and guitar! So now you know.
There were certainly aspects of a hey nonny nonny kind of bravado on stage with the group clearly reacting off the audiences enjoyment but there was a battle swagger within the musicality that demanded a reverence at times as well, certainly standing Skyforger apart from happy, happy joy, joy groups such as Turisas, Korpiklaani and Finntroll. It was very wild (naturally drunkenly so) down the front not even some calming flute-work was going to calm this mob down, the Thunderforge was well and truly stoked. This made taking notes and photos virtually impossible, standing up was tricky enough and it was essential to neck as much mead as possible whilst the band played on. One thing that certainly struck was the rousing Song Of The Northern Swords but on the whole this was a show that I would love to relive all over again from a sober less boisterous position but lets face it that’s hardly likely to happen.
Pete Woods
LONDON PURPLE TURTLE 17/02/07