Music / Previews
Metal & Prog Picks: February 2018
Cello metal, pirate metal, operatic metal, melodic death metal, gothic metal, ‘post-metal’, rockgrass . . . what a brilliant month we have ahead. Once again: a quick note about sold-out shows. We try to keep the coming soon section as up-to-date as possible, but Marillion, Jethro Tull, Cannibal Corpse, Myles Kennedy, Hayseed Dixie and the Piratefest have all sold out well in advance. Last time we checked there were just a handful of tickets left for Yes too.
So what’s going to sell out next? Check out the coming soons and you’ll see that Bath’s rather lovely Forum has grabbed shows on two autumn tours that have been expanded by popular demand. Camel make a welcome return to play the great Moonmadness album in full on a UK jaunt that winds up at the Albert Hall. The reinvigorated (mostly by Bristol’s very own Haz Wheaton) Hawkwind also pitch up here in November with their In Search of Utopia – Infinity and Beyond tour with an orchestra. This was originally to have been a one-off show at the London Palladium, but tickets sold out so quickly that the Hawks have turned it into a full tour.
UPDATE: following the abrupt closure of the Bierkeller, this month’s Therion show has been moved to Fiddlers in Bedminster and next month’s Cannibal Corpse gig has shifted to the Marble Factory. Shows booked further ahead at the Bierkeller are expected to moved to other local venues too. Watch this space for details of the metal/prog ones.
is needed now More than ever
You’ll also notice that Bristol’s very own Tax the Heat have added a gig at Rough Trade on April 7. This is one of just two launch shows for their second album, Change Your Position, which is released by Nuclear Blast on March 9. Advance tickets for this one are available from the band’s website.
Louisiana, Feb 12
If stoner metal is your bag, baby, check out this San Francisco quartet, whose Louisiana show is one of just three UK dates on their European jaunt. They boast all the usual influences (Sabbath, Pentagram, etc), with a psych twist and even some Floydian guitar. They’re touring with Thrill Jockey labelmates Dommengang, who also draw deeply from the ’70s hard rock well.
Fiddlers, Feb 13
Those sad, elderly punk rockers who appoint themselves the curators of rock history still like to bang on about ELP and Tales from Topographic Oceans (which Yes are performing at the Colston Hall next month – woo-hoo!) representing the pinnacle of prog rock excess. But most of these people haven’t been to a gig for several decades and are completely unaware of the rise of prog-metal, much of which makes anything produced in the 1970s seem like the MC5. These acts don’t get any grander than Swedish symphonic metallers Therion, whose lyrics are written by academic and occultist Thomas Karlsson. This lot frequently record with huge orchestras and operatic choirs, though budgetary constraints mean they can rarely afford to take them on tour – especially in the UK, where their profile is not exactly high. But Therion did bring a choir (complete with obligatory fat lady) last time they played round these parts headlining the 2006 ProgPower Festival at Cheltenham Racecourse – and a stunning performance it was too. Now founder Christofer Johnsson is about to unleash his most ambitious work to date: The Beloved Antichrist, a three hour metal opera based on Vladimir Solovyov’s A Short Tale of the Antichrist, which has 29 different singing roles. It’s not clear how much of this Therion will be performing in Bristol. But as it’s only released by Nuclear Blast (on three CDs – or six vinyl LPs if you’re feeling flush – with accompanying 48 page book, obviously) a few days before they hit the Bierkeller, we have little time to digest it in advance. Support comes from Russian symphonic metallers Imperial Age and Germany’s Null Positiv.
Arch Enemy/Wintersun/Tribulation
O2 Academy, Feb 14
Some metalheads are a tad sniffy about Arch Enemy (Memo to ‘the kids’: there’s no room for snootiness in metal), but it’s hard to understand why. Sure, they’ve replaced shouty vegan lady Angela Gossow (who remains the band’s manager) with equally large-lunged shouty vegan lady Alissa White-Gluz, but to these ears their brand of melodic death metal sounds just as potent as ever. Former Carcass guitarist Michael Amott brings the old-skool metal melody while recently recruited fellow guitarist Jeff Loomis, formerly of Nevermore, adds a prog-metal edge. Their tenth album Will to Power is out now. This is the first time they’ve headlined the Academy, having supported Kreator here back in 2014. Two classy support acts make this a show for which early arrival is mandatory: Finnish metallers Wintersun, founded by former Ensiferum fella Jari Mäenpää; and goth-tinged Swedish melodic death metallers Tribulation, who were the only band brave enough to wear guyliner at the 2015 Temples Festival.
Fleece, Feb 14
Just ten months on from their previous Fleece show, the original ‘rockgrass’ act return, still plugging the Free Your Mind . . . and Your Grass Will Follow album. This continues the dilution of rock’n’metal covers with some unwelcome other stuff (Love Train, anybody?), but – hey – it does include a cover of Skynyrd’s brilliant The Ballad of Curtis Loew, so that’s OK. If you haven’t seem ’em for a while, you may wish to know that while John Wheeler remains at the helm the Reno brothers have left to form a more traditional bluegrass outfit. They’ve been replaced by Hippy Joe Hymas on mandolin and Tim Carter on banjo.
Thekla, Feb 14
Last seen here at the 2014 Temples Festival, Amenra are the kind of act lumbered with such meaningless Pseud’s Corner labels as ‘post-metal’ and ‘artcore’ to draw in our hipster friends. What they actually deliver is a hypnotic brand of droning metal, served up with complementary, often pastoral projections flooding the entire stage and backdrop. At Temples, the effect was spoiled only slightly by the fact that their projector was positioned so close to the ground that less enraptured members of the audience found they could make amusing rabbit ears. Japanese co-headliners Boris were last seen in Bristol at the Fleece back in December 2016, when they played a cracking show to celebrate the 10th anniversary of their Pink album. See if you can keep your eyes off bonkers, headset-wearing, screaming, sticks-aloft drummer/vocalist Atsuo. It’s just a crying shame that this show clashes with Arch Enemy.
Cube, Feb 16
Metal in general and Nottingham’s Dystopian Future Movies in particular make a welcome return to the Cube, this time to headline a triple bill with their self-styled “heavy, experimental post-rock”. Support comes from doomy, lo-fi, instrumental riffmeisters Soden from none-too-metal Worcestershire and Bristol’s very own purveyors of “blackened doom pop”, Age Decay.
Thekla, Feb 17
There’s a case to be made that dour notherners Paradise Lost were way ahead of their time in anticipating the goth-metal boom, especially with 1997’s genre-defining One Second album. But being a name to drop butters no parsnips, and after losing their way somewhat with bizarre fan-shedding electronic experimentation they returned to their goth/doom-metal roots and now find themselves signed to Nuclear Blast – the label that’s home to so many of the acts they influenced – for 15th album Medusa. Like a certain fictional band we won’t mention here, Paradise Lost have worked their way through a remarkable number of drummers, but founders Nick Holmes, Gregor Mackintosh, Aaron Aedy and Stephen Edmonson have stayed the course throughout their 30 year career.
Trinity, Feb 20
It’s a belated happy birthday to Bob Catley (70) and Tony Clarkin (71), both of whom hit their eighth decades since they last played Bristol back in 2016. That’s right: although Magnum reached their commercial peak in the mid-80s, the band’s co-founders both belong to an earlier generation, being Brummie contemporaries of Sabbath and Zeppelin. It’s fair to say that vocalist Catley has been sounding a tad croaky of late, but guitarist and chief songwriter Clarkin has been on fire ever since Magnum reformed and seized control of their destiny back in 2002. His prodigious work rate means we get a new album of uniformly high quality on a virtually annual basis these days, each of which charts higher than its predecessor. The last one, Sacred Blood ‘Divine’ Lies, was their biggest hit since 1992. Newie Lost on the Road to Eternity is out now and this Bristol show is the first date on yet another epic trek that will keep the band on the road until the middle of April. Now that’s a tour, kids. Lovely to see a rare metal show at the Trinity too.
Thekla, Feb 21
They look great and their stage show is an aggressive, high-energy metal workout. The music? Not so good. Until now, anyway. But let’s give the Wendy O. Williams-influenced LA metallers’ third album, Lilith, a chance, eh? Heidi Shepherd, Carla Harvey and, er, those blokes were last seen in Bristol at the Marble Factory 10 months ago and now return to the more bijou Thekla. Fascinating fact: Ms. Harvey has a degree in Mortuary Science and plans to forge a second career in carving up cadavers at her own funeral home once she’s done with the shouting.
The Temperance Movement/Thomas Wynn and the Believers
O2 Academy, Feb 22
From their Bristol debut at the Louisiana back in 2013 to the Academy, via the Thekla, classy Brit heavy blues rockers The Temperance Movement have enjoyed a rise that merits the description ‘meteoric’, taking in two top 20 albums and a tour with the Rolling Stones along the way. Third album A Deeper Cut is due out a few days before this latest UK jaunt commences and marks new guitarist Matt White’s debut recording with the band. An accomplished bunch of London session musicians with CVs of shame (Jamiroquai, Katie Melua, etc), their masterstroke was to find charismatic Scottish vocalist Phil Campbell (not that one). Campbell’s dance moves might threaten to make the late Joe Cocker look gainly, but his rich, powerful and versatile voice is pitched somewhere in the vicinity of Rod Stewart, Steve Marriott and Frankie Miller. Get there nice’n’early for support act Thomas Wynn and the Believers, fronted by brother and sister duo Thomas and Olivia. Boasting plenty of crossover appeal to our chums in B24/7’s Americana department, this lot have toured with the likes of Cheap Trick, the Drive-By Truckers and Gov’t Mule. This is their very first UK tour, in support of new album Wade Waist Deep.
Bear Inn, Weston, Feb 23
Yeah, that Anvil. In Weston-super-Mare. The days of packing the Academy on the back of Sacha Gervasi’s documentary now long behind them, the veteran Canadian trio are back to playing to their more modestly proportioned hardcore audience. They’re touring in support of 17th studio album Pounding the Pavement, which includes such splendidly titled ditties as Smash Your Face and Rock That Shit. As for the Bear Inn, we hear good things about this place (mostly from Bristolian southern rockers Sons of Liberty). It’s got very prog/metal-friendly management, suggesting that this, their biggest show to date, is well worth the risk of a journey beyond civilisation.
Piratefest 2018: Alestorm/The Dread Crew of Oddwood/Rumahoy
Motion, Feb 24
For the benefit of those who didn’t know that pirate metal was a thing, here’s a brief primer: the originators of this sub-genre of folk metal are generally agreed to be the German band Running Wild with their Under Jolly Roger album back in 1987. But it’s multi-national plank-walkers Alestorm who have made this hugely entertaining genre their own, with five grog’n’wench-fuelled studio albums to date. The latest of these, No Grave But the Sea, actually crawled into the UK top 50. Fascinating fact: frontman Christopher Bowes threw in a masters degree in mathematics at Bristol University to pursue a career in pirate metal and still lives in the city. Last time Alestorm played here, supporting Sabaton at the Academy, they brought their giant inflatable duck. One trusts they’ll top that at their own touring Piratefast. Support comes from Californians The Dread Crew of Oddwood, whose brand of ‘heavy mahogany’ is performed on acoustic instruments. They’ve been known to cover Korpiklaani’s Wooden Pints, which is good enough for us. Opening the show are the anonymous, balaclava-clad Rumahoy, led by one Captain Yarrface. Dress up – it’s going to be silly. Oh, and it’s also been sold out for ages.
Colston Hall, Feb 28
Short-lived novelty act? Try telling that to Apocalyptica, the metal-loving Sibelius Institute graduates who released their self-explanatory Plays Metallica by Four Cellos album 22 years ago. Eight albums and four million sales on, they now play their biggest gig in Bristol (their previous show was at the Academy back in November 2015). Naturally, the quartet couldn’t just carry on doing Metallica songs ad infinitum, so broadened their palette to include covers of the likes of Slayer, Sepultura, Rammstein, Pantera and, um, Edvard Grieg. They’ve also been guilty of diluting their USP somewhat by bringing in guest vocalists for their own material. The good news is that this is a back to basics tour, during which they’ll play that debut album in its entirety along with a bunch of other Metallica classics.
COMING SOON
Here’s our essential diary of upcoming gigs that should be of interest to anyone of a rockin’ disposition.
Stone Broken/Jared James Nichols/The Bad Flowers, Fleece, March 7
Venom Inc/Suffocation, Bierkeller, March 9
Sepultura, SWX, March 13
Yes, Colston Hall, March 13
Cannibal Corpse, Marble Factory, March 16
Amplifier, Exchange, March 18
Skid Row/Toseland/Bad Touch, O2 Academy, March 20
Myles Kennedy, Thekla, March 24
Testament/Annihilator/Vader, Motion, March 29
Quireboys, Thekla, April 6
Tax the Heat, Rough Trade, April 7
Epica/Myrkur/Oceans of Slumber, O2 Academy, April 8
Jethro Tull, Colston Hall, April 9
The Dead Daisies/The Treatment/The Amorettes, O2 Academy, April 14
Marillion, Colston Hall, April 17
Trivium, O2 Academy, April 19
Skindred, O2 Academy, April 25
G3 2018: Joe Satriani/John Petrucci/Uli Jon Roth, Colston Hall, April 26
Omnium Gatherum/Skalmöld, Bierkeller, April 26
Peter Hammill, The Lantern, April 29
Bernie Marsden/Hand of Dimes, Fleece, April 29
Lionize/Planet of Zeus, Fleece, May 3
Conan/Monolord, Thekla, May 14
Machine Head, O2 Academy, May 15
Wildhearts/Reef/Terrorvision, Marble Factory, May 25
Camel, The Forum, Bath, Sept 11
Evil Scarecrow, Marble Factory, Oct 11
Hawkwind, The Forum, Bath, Nov 24
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