Live Review : Lagerstein + Footprints In The Custard + Impavidus + Thrashatouille @ Rebellion, Manchester on September 20th 2019

Do you like your music laced with silliness? Do you enjoy inflatables? Pirate hats? Mankinis?

Then my dear ROCKFLESH friends, I have found the line up for you.

I have returned from my involuntary hiatus (there was infidelity, unexpectedly relationship status changes,  money problems, bereavement... more bereavement... and some drum and bass) to delve headfirst into the sublimely weird and wonderful side of metal.

Metal is usually an array of the most colourful characters clad in black and tonight the battle jackets are complemented with pirate attire, UV paint litters the audience in Rebellion. It's Friday, it’s probably pay day for some of us, and spirits are high.

The festivities kick off with undoubtedly the most beautiful thing I've ever heard... a song about McDonalds.

Lets be frank, when you are as chunky as I am, a song about McDonalds is musical euphoria. My recent heartbreak has done nothing to curb my appetite and I could murder a big Mac.

Billing themselves as a world first with their unique brand of Chef Metal, Thrashatouille are the perfect warm up for tonight. Utilising an array of inflatable props, the mosh pit is soon bouncing with men being carried on blow up icecreams and wearing floatable doughnuts.

My heart stops for a brief second as the singer handles a tray of cakes and utters the words “12 cakes, 1 guy”  in the vein of a porno nobody asked to see... but it's fine, he’s eating the cakes and not f**king them as I had feared.

Sexy food games aside, Thrashatouille obviously still have youth on their side which gives their performance a hungry edge (see what I did there? Hungry? Chef Metal? Hungry... oh whatever) and it's infectiously fun. One guys bouncing, then 5, then 12, then the whole room.

Impavidus are on next, and I feel this band are here for the purpose of grounding the audience before they get too lost in a flurry of plastic ice cream cones. Good job really... With perfect timing the band bring about a set of finely crafted metal that so lovingly draws influence from many well known styles/genres but has the bands own flavour weaved into the riffs and melodies.

I've owed these guys a good listen since I had to duck out of their gig with Deified at Tank in St Helens hideously early.

Known and adored throughout the North West metal scene and beyond, Impavidus bring a brutal edge to tonight’s line up and it's easy to see why. Front woman Michelle seamlessly switches from soaring melodic clean vocals to crushing guttural roars.

Following Impavidus are fellow Manchester metal heavyweights Footprints in the Custard. Still basking in the glory of an epic (and completely rammed) performance at Bloodstock Open Air, the Comedy metal band are renown across the land for their completely bat shit crazy performances. Rocking up on stage to the sound of Thomas the Tank Engine and wearing outfits that looks like Old Gregg meets Tim Burton meets Borat, Footprints in the Custard well and truly have cemented the image of their arses in my mind forever.

Seriously.  Someone help me.

Highlight was everyone having a good boogie with blow up aliens in the mosh pit to ‘Space Force!’. The crowd always reacts amazingly well to Footprints in the Custard whenever I've seen them.

“Urgh, I hate those guys, they are stupid”

Mate that's the entire point. Your battle jacket is stupid. You obviously don't enjoy fun.

Tonight’s headliners have sailed (yes... I'm choosing to believe they sailed...) in from down under, and what a raucous bunch they are. Australian pirate folk metal act Lagerstein have arrived in swashbuckling style and this land lubber was in no way shape or form prepared for what lay ahead.

I mean literally, I didn't have a pirate hat or anything. Even the Satanic Majesty Johann had left his Captain Jack Sparrow outfit at home.

Consisting of at least 34 members (or maybe I exaggerated and it's just 7), Lagerstein have such a rich folky sound that lends itself amazingly well to the essence of the music they are playing. There’s a camaraderie and unadulterated glee in their set which I haven't seen in other pirate metal acts over the years. Not that I consider myself a connoisseur of the pirate metal genre or anything...

Set highlights included the raunchy and upbeat ‘Wench My Thirst’ which sounds like its taken all the best bits of Status Quo, Motley Crue and AC/DC song mashed together to make a saucy sing along, and the surprisingly odd moment where they all took their shoes off for the ‘Shoey Song’ and proceeded to drink out of said shoes. Audience too.

Shiver me timbers! Just a whole bunch of people. Drinking from shoes. I wonder if people get sick from that? Anyway, never mind, it's pirate AF...

Til next time me heartys.