Power & Glory Festival - The Rock Den, Hatfield 23 August 2014

Small scale festivals within niche markets, you really won't find anything better. For years Progpower in Baarlo is among my annual music highlights and now it seems I have found another guaranteed contender for festival/show of the year in Power & Glory Festival. For those who prefer their sonic spheres, GMM, Bloodstock or whatever let me explain some simple examples which proof my point. The festival is not organized by a company willing to earn good money on you, but by music lovers who care more about the music than you do yourself. The bands usually walk around between the audience and love to have the opportunity to play for you. The beer is priced fairly and at P&G the food was surprisingly Brazilian Pastel and coxinhas. As crowds go they might be small but made up by people who care for music so the atmosphere is always great. Based upon the above my expectations were high while returning to Hatfield and I did not get disappointed. As I decided to have a pizza near my hotel before going to The Rock Den, I arrived late and missed Sonic Scream and part of Toledo Steel. So herewith some of my observations and preferences through the day.

I am not sure if Toledo Steel is UK's answer to Italian Ruler or if it works the other way around, but I liked both shows a lot. Being the younger bands around they also were amongst the faster playing bands and both showed great guitar work and speed metal songs. I did see Toledo Steel earlier this year with Stampede, when I got their EP, so I did recognize the last songs I saw of them. Opposite to these two young bands there where also two older bands I did not know before and who seemed to have stayed closest to their original line-ups looking at the age of most members. Dream Overkill where mainly mid to lower tempo and while sounding good lacked some spice for me. Sacrilege had the nicest T-shirts of the day (so I got one) but also were exploring more mid-tempo areas. I did like some parts of it, although also here a fast kick in your face, would have helped the band drawing more attention. Interesting about these two bands is also that both do not get mentioned in the 800 page NWOBHM encyclopedia (while Sacrilege now had 4 CD's on offer?) This just shows that an encyclopedia is never complete I guess.

Headliners were Witchfynde and candles were alight and the mood got doomy. Very nice show and a worthy closer of the day. Before them we had one hour of Deep Machine and they played a mix of their new CD and older work. Brought with much conviction I liked them even better than last year in Holland when I knew less songs as no CD was released yet.

I know that a festival is never a competition, still some shows you always like better than others. For me the first huge surprise of the day came in Midnight Messiah. I had their CD, but did not have the Elixir albums (quickly got them after the show as they were available on CD or vinyl) This band had a diverse show, great songs and they turned out to be a band that makes you wonder why did they not break big again? A band to follow closely, hopefully I can make it to Heavy Metal Maniacs in October.
The biggest response of the day (in my idea that is) went however to Soldier and well deserved it was. What a good band and very entertaining on stage. Highlights following each other closely with a special mention of "Dogs of War Mothafucka" and their surprising full stage with old members joining in on Sheralee.

So a huge thanks to Dean and all at the Rock Den, for putting this together. I missed out on the Ice Bucket 24 hours challenge (hey where to get such a bucket on Stansted, before entering my plane) so I shall donate. This year there was already an international interest, so maybe this can grow and also more brits start respecting their own great musical heritage. With plans of P&G2 being two days and Stampede headlining the first, chances of me not showing up are pretty low. Finally I got to meet the man who pointed me in the direction of The Rock Den for Stampede (Miles from Soldier) and now he also brought us the song that still hums around while commuting to work "I know where I want to be... Sheralee".
  

Metal Travel Guide

Leaving all press coverage of a disaster behind we left for our scheduled nordic roadtrip on 23 July. Visiting 7 Northern European Capitals meant a lot of driving and ferrying and in order to also explore new horizons on the music front we were partially guided by the Metal Travel Guide. This site tells for a lot of countries and cities, where you can find your rockbars, live venues or CD/LP stores. As we started in Poland I did check, but not went to shops. Also because the Polish component of my music collection is already pretty good represented. After Vilnius on a Sunday with no metal either, we entered the first good CD shop in Riga and after Estonia and Finland I stopped again in Sweden and Norway due to similar reasons as Poland and the fact that in Norway CD shops seem to have followed the Dutch route and basically disappear from the cities.

So herewith a short overview of my findings which start in Latvia. The shop Randoms which we entered in Riga had a department Latvian Metal so that was easy. When asking for help in the shop I left with two great findings. BioMorph - Rupture turns out to be djenty, technical, grunt/clear and nice overall, but less acceptable to the family in the car. Indygo - Decoy is a very Tool inspired affair, but of high level and more compact in their songs. So when driving to our next country I found to have made two great buys for a very decent price as well.

In Tallinn I went to a shop found on MTG and played partially safe, as I looked for and found Estonian band X-Panda who played Holland twice before with good reviews and are coming back to de Boerderij early next year. Again asking for help I got hinted at TNVVNuM. With a name like that it is probably good they make instrumental music only with minor vocal parts. This turned out to be lacking some power to remain interesting, also the scarce vocals better stay out altogether. Musically OK, but not a CD I shall return to many times, yet the risks of buying in the blind.

Helsinki was the last stop with succesfull purchases. Easily the best and most complete shop as well, which such a long and hard name that I could not remember it. Helsinki really has Heavy Metal on the streets in the air and even in the supermarket. Wearing a black T-shirt was just a fashionable thing to do. On the CD's I did play on safe and found two bands I read positive reviews about before. The Chant - New Haven is somewhere towards Sentenced/Katatonia Melancholic and moody. Montage with their self titled debut is probably the best CD of my trip. 70's Hardrock, some progmetal, high voices and great songs. The tip was there, great to find I agreed with the positivism.

Apart from CD's I did look for potential shows, but there we were less lucky. Just missing Kansas in Warsaw and Manowar in Helsinki I did think of going to three extreme Metal bands in Helsinki to sense the atmosphere, but unfortunately found I mixed up dates in my head and we needed to get the ferry to Stockholm the same evening. Final conclusion: Anyone travelling for holidays or work, first check www.metaltravelguide.com as it might lead you to great surprises.

Gary Moore - Murder in the Skies

"Murder in the Skies - Came without a warning".
Gary Moore wrote this song about the Korean Airline that got shot down by the Russians during the Cold War. Next month it is 30 years ago that I drove for the first time with Sergio to Monsters of Rock in Germany to see among many other highlights Gary Moore perform this song live.

Now Sergio is no longer among us! He got shot down with his wife Esther and children Elsemiek and Julian on their way to what was supposed to be a holiday to revisit a country of his past. Still trying to come to terms with this most surreal and unnecessary ends of lives I dug into the only remedy that helps in such occassions: Music.

Sergio was, the saddest of openings talking about a friend, one of the nicest persons around. We knew each other from the football club, but as he was a few years older, we became frineds through music. While having been to similar shows before, the first trip together was to Monsters of Rock in Karlsruhe 1984. I still kept the Tee, since what a line up, with AC/DC, Van Halen, Ozzy, Dio, Gary Moore, Accept and Motley Crue. After this huge success we repeated this trip in 1986 Mannheim and 1987 Pforzheim (85 had no European version) until in 1988 MoR hit Holland for the first time. In those years we went to many, many shows and the last two days I have been playing music we both loved then and now still do or did.

Playing Rush's Moving Pictures yesterday I listened to Witch Hunt and heard a description of some of the emotions that are going around my head at the moment: "Quick to Judge, Quick to Anger, Slow to Understand". Noone knows officially why and what has happened, but all doubts are pointing to them Russians again. This means that the already ridiculous raising of beer glasses between our King and his Argentinian (censored) with Putin during the Olympics earlier this year only becomes more sinister. The guilty ones if found won't bring back the almost 300 lost people and Sergio shall never join me again to a traditional Heavy Metal show.

Dio should be mentioned as well, since we both would mention Dio amongst our favorite all time artists. Similar to Sergio Dio is no longer among us and he seemd by the stories a very good person. Sergio never changed. At the end of the eighties Sergio started moving around for work. When in Aberdeen I still visited him twice and one of the football highlights in our lives was watching the MacDuff Derby in Northern Scotland. When he moved to Brunei I was less tempted to visit him and when he moved to Nigeria I was moving to Brazil myself. In the early 2000's we both returned to Holland and got in contact again. Sergio was one of the examples of a friend I would not see often, but when we met everything was fine.

As we both travel a lot for work we would sometimes not see each other for many months, but when any band from our past would play in Holland I always contacted Sergio and he would join if he could. Only last week I saw an announcement of Graham Bonnet and Magnum playing Holland this autumn thinking to myself this deserves a group going. Some two months ago I tried to get friends interested in joining me to a Monsters of Rock Cruise next year. Sergio replied we would do that when retired. Given we were working on advancing our retirements, this could have worked soonish. Now the Sailing Ships might sail, but can I ever join not thinking of Sergio who should be there next to me at the bar?

I am still going all over the place with my thoughts, but do know I shall remeber Sergio as someone who cared as a person and loved his Heavy Metal. I shall watch the skies looking for a Rainbow in the Dark. If ever spotted maybe a God exists after all, but for sure Sergio would still be around.

Sergio: We Rock!!

Intervals - A Voice Within

Great Worldcup. lots of exiting matches, beautiful goals and Holland is still in. Enough reasons to go quiet on the Blog front, but this does not mean that I have not found great new music the last month. Sure that more reviews shall follow I quickly have to get this one out to the World, as it is very likely among my favorites of 2014 by the end of the year.

Intervals: I saw them opening earlier this year for a modern djenty, proggy metal tour with The Safety Fire, Tesseract and Protest the Hero. I already liked the live show at the time, but absolutely love this CD. This is new and fresh and modern, yet very much leaning on Tech- and Prog metal basics. Originally this was an instrumental band and you can hear that without vocals they would be interesting enough (there is one short instrumental break in the calm Breathe with great Satriani/Schon like solo ending). Still instrumental bands usually limit themselves to musician audiences. Now they have added Mike Semesky on vocals of earlier The Haarp Machine fame. While he shouted pretty often in those days he now restricts to clean vocals only, which opens many more doors. Still he is no Dio, Tate or Alder and the stars of this band are playing the instruments. While at first listen the mastering of instruments are clear, after repeat listens the songs really come alive and I keep on hearing more new intervals, while melodies start sticking in my head.

Yes this band might so far be the discovery of the year to me, both live and on CD. While saying that at the same time I did get another new band after a raving Prog Magazine review, but shall need at least 20 more sessions, before grasping that one in full. In the meantime I shall play this one a lot during the coming weeks and for those with an interest I believe it is still available for full streaming on Youtube, so give them a try. The future is bright, let's hope it is also Orange 10 days from now.  

Rob Lamothe, Fan Halen, Anatomy of I - Kaderock Den Haag 7 June 2014

Summer arriving and the free festivals are back. With Kaderock being usually the most guitar driven one (together with Pleinpop which is not going to hapen this year), we got offered some good bands and to me the absolute highlight in having Rob Lamothe over. The former (or current? forgot to ask) vocalist of The Riverdogs, now solo in singer songwriter format.

The first band I saw was Fan Halen. A very nice coverband of guess who? I did recognize the vocalist from some shows in the eighties. Musically very strong and a singer who makes a show of it, I would say one of the better coverbands I have seen.Going through the Classic years of Van Halen nice to hear those again.

One hour later we got Rob Lamothe hitting the stage. He was supported by two locals on bass and drums, which obviously limited the possibilities of shouting for Riverdogs songs. Not by any means as hard rocking as twenty years ago, he still owns one of the absolute best voices around. I do not know all the titles of his new songs, but recognized some (House of the Rising Sun). When before closing with Sailing Ships he complimented me on my 1994 Riverdogs Tee (which actually was Karin's at the time) I did have my two seconds of fame in the sun. Not backed up by son and daughter this year for emotional addings, another great performance of that voice.

In the evening I closed Kaderock on a heavier note enjoying Anatomy of I. This technical Death Metal band had on CD great names as Steve Di Giorgio on bass and Dirk Verbueren on drums, now turned all Dutch. I have the CD, but do not know it well enough to recognize the songs. This did not matter for the energy. The far too short set ended with a replay of the opening song and definitely a band to see if in town or nearby.

Finally I did have a surprising highlight in meeting Mr. Lamothe outside when I came back from a dinner break with Tiago. Seems that I am taking up this habit of having my picture taken with celebrities, so here we go.

The Tangent / Karmakanic - de Boerderij Zoetermeer 30 May 2014

This was a strange show! We had six people on stage twice, all of the  highest level at their instrument. The first hour they were called Karmakanic and played a few of their songs, then after the break they are the Tangent and treat us on an overview from that band. Only minor changes and participations and still we got two very different shows.

Karmakanic are headed by bass player Jonas Reingold and have in vocalist Goran Edman (Madison, John Norum, Yngwie Malmsteen and many .many others) a high class vocalist. I quite liked their first album with some sci-fi-prog short songs and that voice. Herefter they moved into Flower King areas (Mr. J.R. in command?) with many long songs that drag on without anything exciting happening. Live they were pretty much the same: technically sometimes amazing, while at the same time pretty boring. Sorry but just not my band or mood of the day.

How different would the same band be, when after the break they returned as The Tangent. Headed by the ridiculously under-appreciated Andy Tillison, suddenly things started happening on stage. Opening with uptempo Evening TV, we did put the kettle on for a pot of high class prog. Their songs might be as long, but things are happening and we get a show to enjoy. This goes from the announcements inbetween untill the much heavier rocking instrumental parts. Highlights also on Luke Machin on guitars. Being son-age to most of the band he did proof that the buzz in England around his playing is justified. Talking about English feedback, not very long ago Mr. Tillison stated in Prog magazine that touring with a prog band is a perfect way of wasting money. Looking at the relatively small audience yesterday I guess he was right. Too bad as the show was very good and felt too short.

After a final break the band returned for a double encore playing one song from both bands. This only to confirm my thoughts. Karmakanic being so-so and The Tangent very convincing even playing a new heavy song that is still to be recorded. As today both bands are playing Celebr8.3 in London, which I had to miss, I guess Karmakanic has to work hard to fit the bill, while The Tangent is a deserved headliner.

Night Demon - Cafe de Vinger The Hague, 27 May 2014

The Hague Heavy Metal Alliance: a non profit organisation promoting Heavy Metal shows in The Hague and finally I could make it to one. Night Demon and Venator, playing Cafe de Vinger. An evening of old school heavy metal was promised and delivered.

Support band Venator had the screams, the guitars and the whoo-ho-hoa sing alongs. The best part of this is that being not familiar with their music it sounds nice at first listen. Although I always recommend a cover (unless they played one I did not know). Hereafter came Night Demon, being on a small tour through Europe. This turned out to be a nice heavy trio, that sounded not much different from the NWOBHM bands that came 35 years before them. This fact was even made clearer by the two Flying V's and the covers they played: Lightning to the Nations and Axe Crazy. Their own songs were  new to me, but were all up-tempo with some nice guitars and sounding good. Next Saturday we have Fortarock in Holland which is this year's biggest metal festival. I doubt I shall bother to go there, as to me these Tuesday night surprises are so much nicer. Interesting observation from the vocalist was that since we were not in the USA, probably most of us should get up the next morning for work so they finished shortly after midnight. So people with a job don't go to weekday metal shows in the US, that is sad. I enjoyed this evening and hope for more bands of this level coming to The Hague. For appreciation of the band got the T-shirt and EP, to find out they played Radar Love in the past live. When I pointed the band that they were in the city of Radar Love, so an easy succes, I learned the new line-up did not play this song yet. A pity, but I preferred the Diamond Head and Jaguar covers anyway. Another discovery of a good band and they shall return next year for Very Eavy festival.