Martyr - De Zwarte Ruiter The Hague , 19 April 2024

The middle week of April 2024 shall be remembered by me as the week of great free metal gigs. Last Wednesday Riot City presented their speedmetal masterclass and two days later it was Martyr's turn to show us why they remain among the best Heavy Metal bands in Holland. The location to show this was at least surprising with de Zwarte Ruiter. This bar does also play rock music when no bands are around, but I would not expect a Heavy Metal band down there as their usual crowd is a tat too fashionable for old school metal. In advance people were warning about a busy bar, but with the hipsters looking for alternatives this evening it was all very easy regarding standing place and bar access. What we did get was many known faces. So the evening was already a success before it even started. 

Martyr opened their set with Raise Your Horns, Unite and thereafter they did what they usually do. Metal on, apart from their Queensryche alike ballad. The known faces in the room all have seen Martyr plenty of times over the past years, so this turned out to be an evening of likeminded souls and no surprises. Death walked around the room during their closing song and I don't know what fake blood I got over my head, but still traces of red are upon me. This was one fine evening of metal again and maybe a few Zwarte Ruiter regulars have been introduced to the joy of live metal shows and find their way to more gigs one day. Finally the afterparty was by a DJ. With a name like Motorkontje I expected a biker chic in bikini. Well we did not get that, but a guy with a metal wig on and sunglasses. To his credit the evening did not die in horrible sounds and the atmosphere continued lively and pleasant.