OPETH, MAYHEM and VENOM PRISON bring deliverance to DAMNATION FESTIVAL.
LEEDS UNIVERSITY UNION, LEEDS
Opeth and Mayhem bring sonic deliverance to Leeds
NOW CELEBRATING ITS 15th
year, Damnation’s instinctive understanding of the bond between extreme metal’s old-school, uncompromising ethics and its thirst for sonic adventurism has led to a community of committed festivalgoers still trying to work out the warren that is the university building. Those who find their way to the
Eyesore stage get to witness ALUNAH bringing their signature ethereal doom to kick off today’s antics. Meanwhile, those burrowing their way to the second Tone MGMT stage fare less well, as the finer elements of Glawegieans
GODEATER’S aggressive tech get lost somewhere in the room’s PA. Robeclad THE INFERNAL SEA get an early afternoon slot to themselves on the fourth, Cult Never Dies stage, and prove they’ve the chops to back the imagery, playing with two chalice-bearers stood unnervingly still before their flaying BM. While proggy Finnish/british metallers WHEEL fill out the Eyesore stage with Tool-esque melodies,
CARNATION’S combination of oldschool, d-beat-inflected DM grooves and slamming, tech-minded austerity get both a better sound on the second stage and a crowd of heabangers clearly under the spell of frontman Simon Duson’s Darth Maul get-up.
RAGING SPEEDHORN were Damnation’s first headlners, and tonight they get to kick off the main stage with all the combination of yobbish aggro -courtesy of Daniel
Cook and Frank Regan’s tag-teamed vocals - and thick, precisely calibrated grooves you could still hope for. On a more elevated trip, violin makes for a suitably reedy complement to DAWN RAY’D’S folk-infused BM on the fourth stage. Outspokenly antifascist, they use their moment to issue a call for all to unite against intolerance and elitism. Hailing from Portland, but more musically aligned with the Georgian scene, LORD DYING’S bristling riffage and progressive, open-ended dynamics have a sense of unfolding narrative that doesn’t fully gel on the third stage, never quite going beyond the sum of their parts. The aggro-fuelled BLOOD RED THRONE, however, crush it at the Tone MGMT stage. A jammed-packed pit and sweaty bodies stacked up to the bar greet their mid-afternoon death metal assault.
MGŁA enter an absolutely packed Jäger stage amidst an aura of esoteric fog. Imposing, faceless black shadows, they rise to the stage like demonic entities up emerging from the depths of hell, consuming the substantial crowd with their eerie onstage presence and vehement riffage. If the turnout for
EARTH SHIP is subsequently smaller than they deserve, their desert rock with a deathly twist provides a break from the morning’s relentless blasting.
While INTER ARMA’S epic, craniumjuddering sludge marks out a scenic tour of Hades on the second stage, classically trained, metal-inspired cellist JO QUAIL weaves a very different exploratory spell in the Eyesore stage. She usually cuts a solitary figure but comes armed with the addition of a live guitarist and drummer. The extra accompaniment bolsters the sonics but denudes the mystique.
‘For those who buried their sons, under bone white crosses’, bellows the hulking
PRIMORDIAL frontman Alan Averill as he rises to the main stage – cue relentless headbanging. He holds the crowd like an ancient Celtic king commanding his devoted (and plentiful) followers. Avant-garde black metal outfit VOICES stick up pictures of their apparent patron saint Rick James, but take a while to feel the funk, eventually doing the melodrama of their records justice. Drawn more from the hardcore scene, but with tensile, volatile energy to spare, BIRDS IN ROW’S incendiary and emotional second stage set wins an army of new fans. A PALE HORSE NAMED DEATH deliver us into the night with their gothic melodies. Their doomy, 90s-tinged metal reverberates within the cramped confinements of the Eyesore stage, but good luck getting in!
The Scandinavian game is strong tonight. Holding the torch of true Norwegian black metal lit by Mayhem, the fourth stage hosts MORK. Their raw and primal aggression, interspersed with atmospheric melodies and mixture of ferocious gutturals and baritones, makes for an intoxicating live experience.
On the main stage, ALCEST prove as uplifting a shaft of light as ever. Frontman Neige’s melodiously detached presence shimmers, while drummer Winterhalter hits hard. The heavier, more direct approach of new record Spiritual Instinct lends itself to live performance, and though technical hitches occasionally break the spell, once their wistful swathe returns, reality drifts into a dreamlike distance.
Upon GAAHLS WYRD’S entrance to the second stage, the crowd are immediately locked into the BM legend’s icy stare. Bassist Eld and guitarists Lust Kilman and Andreas Fosse Salbu add light relief, slaying their guitars in synchronisation to the dramatic weight of new material, and purists appreciate the addition of Gorgoroth and Trelldom tracks. VINTAGE CARAVAN’S stupendously tight yet fluid blues rock draws a big crowd to the third stage, grateful for an accommodating, earthier groove. The PA blackouts that interfere with
MAYHEM become annoying enough for some to drift away from a heaving stage, but the band persevere. The imperious presence of frontman
Attila Csihar and his orc-like sentinel Necrobutcher stand as defiant testimony to black metal’s original power source, by turns uncomfortably grating and cryptically haunting. Equally unstable are CROWHURST on the fourth stage, their blackened sludge taking on a genuine wild, haunted energy that you can’t fake, but can clearly enhance with a bottle of Buckfast by your side. VENOM PRISON have understandably pulled in the numbers with their primitive, uncompromising death metal. Frontwoman Larissa Stupar beats the audience into submission with her ferocious vocal eruptions and politically charged addresses.
Jared Warren and Coady Willis of
BIG BUSINESS don’t just close the Eyesore stage, they clobber it to death, utterly abusing their instruments as they rumble enraptured through their rocking take on sludge. Jared fills the room with humongous riffs on his bass while Coady pounds his kit, channelling alt-oddballs Melvins and something altogether eerier before a flagging but appreciative crowd. IMPERIAL TRIUMPHANT close the Cult Never Dies stage to a dwindling congregation – it seems few got the memo about the avantgarde occultists. The Brooklyn black metallers’ chilling golden masks and unnerving ambience make a for unique hypnotic experience, but the crowd is severely lacking in energy and quantity. No such indignity for OPETH, and if their current incarnation isn’t the most crescendo-reaching vibe for a headliner, the sheer mastery on display, the warmth of the groove kneading from every angle, and both Mikael Åkerfeldt’s customary dry wit and return of death metal growls for the likes of Deliverance ensure Damnation ends in celebratory style. TOM O’BOYLE/ALICE PATTILLO/
JONATHAN SELZER
MAYHEM OFFER DEFIANT TESTIMONY TO BM’S ORIGINAL POWER SOURCE