Live Review : Marduk + Wiegedood + Vader + Hidden Mothers + Impalement + Risen Dread @ Rebellion and Star And Garter on March 17th 2022

Well apparently all that stuff and nonsense is over with and we are back in business with a capital ACK. How do I know that, I hear you cry? Well last night I did not one, but two shows almost simultaneously, both were big name bands (in our small world), both were packed to the rafters, and both tingled with the charge of expectation and emotion. But two shows, I hear you again cry, how and more importantly why? Well, the why was caused by staff sickness here at ROCKFLESH towers and our tenacious commitment to cover every tour that trundles through the north west. the how is a simple one of staggered start times and my trusty stead (i.e. me push bike).  So I start my odyssey at Rebellion and, due to the other show on the other side of town being curtailed to just two bands, this will be my home for the first three acts.

The United Titans tour is value for money personified. Two major name extreme metal outfits, one (Vader) from the death metal stable and the other (Marduk) from the hallowed halls of Black metal. Add to that two plucky upstarts, who are already attracting a lot of attention and you have a wallet friendly evening of entertainment. It therefore is of no surprise that at the very un-metal hour of 6pm the queue to get in stretches around the block. The Risen Dread are from Dublin and have the unenviable task of serenading that queue as it finally enters the building. They may already be a number of shows into this tour but you can tell the novelty of being back on stage doing what they do best hasn’t worn off yet. They may well be simply soundtracking most people’s first beer of the night but there is still a shared look of delight across their collective faces. There are dollops of Machine Head and hefty chunks of Pantera, but really all you need to know it that it is loud, riotous and satisfactorily cleanses the pallet for what is to come.

There is a shared mass sense of expectation about up-coming Swiss Blackened Metallers Impalement. In a scene that can sometimes feel stagnant and stuck in its way, there is no denying that their 2020 self-titled debut blew a hell of a lot of cobwebs away. Right from the off it is obvious that they are here to prove a point and that point is that there is a new kid on the block. Yes, in places it skates perilously close to the territory held by Behemoth and Belphegor, but there is enough originality here to leave you with the impression that there may well be something very special indeed stirring in those Swiss mountains.

Vader are no strangers to these shores, in fact no strangers to this very city and this very stage, but that does not stop Mancunia’s Death Metal hordes treating them like conquering heroes. The place is packed, beyond packed. The front is a solid wall of bodies and the pit itself struggles to gain traction because of the very fact of the amount of people in the room. Lockdown seems to have shifted the axis and a band that could, unkindly, have been described as an also ran is now treated with utter reverence. This is a co-headlining tour and Vader give us a headline set, actually a greatest hits headline set to be honest. They have dropped a new album,  “Solitude in Madness” during lockdown, but we get just two slices from it and instead they choose to concentrate on pre 2005 material with a whopping four tracks from the legendary “De Profundis”. The crowd lap of the old skool stuff and there is just such a buoyant, almost life affirming aura of a band back doing what they love and audience adoring every second of it. Vader are never going to be revolutionary and they are never going to redefine metal, but in that hour and a quarter it doesn’t matter as they are utterly sensational.

I need to apologise to Hidden Mothers as, in my attempt to be in two places at once, they are the one act that pulls the short straw. I leave Vader for fifteen minutes to race across town to catch a snippet of their stint supporting Wiegedood at the Star & Garter, before racing back to see the finale of the Polish legends set (and then rushing back to see Wiegedood, but more of that soon). Their lot in life is ethereal post Black Metal with layers of haunting melodies and what I do see is mighty impressive. They have been a band for barely three years but they have managed to turn a lot of heads in that short time, which is rather remarkable when you consider that we had a global pandemic in the middle. The two tracks I do see (both apparently new compositions) are rapturously received by the heaving masses. This connection with the crowd is heightened by the fact that Steffan and Liam literally perform in the pit due to the drumkit taking up most of the available room on the stage. I wish I had stayed for more but there was Polish Death Metal calling my name.

I return however to the Star & Garter in plenty of time though for tonight’s (at least in this venue) main event. As I said both venues are packed, and both offer Black Metal royalty, but the difference in audience is palpable. Whereas Rebellion is full of beer-soaked pit dwellers, Star & Garter is home to much more refined and mature chin-stroking crowd. At no point do Wiegedood get a flaying cauldron of bodies, instead the crowd stands stock still and as one reverentially bang their heads. It is as if the crowd here at Star & Garter are connecting with the music on a cerebral, even spiritual level, as compared to the carnal orgy going on back on Rebellion. And that spiritual point is key as Wiegedood are nothing short of a religious experience. They create a blistering intense tunnel of noise that continually loops back in on itself. Its hypnotic, transcendental and utterly brutal.

Opener ‘FN SCAR 16’ is a cacophony of repeating refrains that eats into your brain. Its circular riff is utterly compelling, a blast of pure euphoric energy. The beauty of a small venue is that you can see close-up the sound being conjured up by its creators, and it is utterly mesmerising to watch Levy Seynaeve’s fingers blur across the fretboard as he ushers forth the crescendos of sound. It becomes clear that for something that sounds so complex, their set up and approach is actually really simplistic. There is no bass, just two guitars creating a wall of sonic distortion. 

There is very little interaction and very little movement, everything is achieved through the music, and it is utterly spellbinding. I have never felt fifty minutes go by so quickly, I am not sure whether I was brainwashed by the utter intensity of the whole thing, but from where I am standing, no sooner as the first track ceased then Levy is telling us they have one more to go.  

Wiegedood are the intelligent face of Black Metal. They are using its rough canvas to weave enthralling and absorbing aural pictures. It may seem bizarre to describe brittle extreme metal as emotive and heart-rendering, but it is. Its spiralling structures eat into your soul and twenty-four hours later I still feel deeply effected by it. Utterly incredible.

But my night does not end there, I have more Black Metal to feast on back at Rebellion, in the shape of Swedish overlords of the scene Marduk. The juxtaposition between the two acts is huge. They maybe playing in the same musical sandbox but they are doing so in remarkably different ways. Wiegeddood didn’t bother within anything as common as stage craft, they just let the waves of sound do the talking. Far on the other end of the scale, Marduk are consummate performers, and they use every inch of Rebellion’s recently extended stage. Wiegedood may well have been performing a ceremony, but Marduk are putting on a show. Mortuus is everywhere, like a demonic ringleader he feeds off the energy flowing from his baying crowd. There seems to have been a changing of the guard whilst I was otherwise occupied at Star & Garter. The Death Metal kids have either retired to the bar, gone to the smoking zone or buggered off home and the Black Metal Legions have taken over the asylum.

Marduk have been doing this for thirty-two years and they do it bloody well. It’s essentially pantomime with added satanism. Lots of call and response, lots of posturing and lots of gurning. It feels slightly lightweight after the utter unrelenting intensity of Wiegedood, but that doesn’t stop it being unapologetic fun and highly entertaining. They also give value for money in spades as we get another full headline slot that buffers right up against the venues curfew. Six hours for twenty odd quid can’t be bad.

So after my inaugural attempt to double park at gigs, what have I learnt? Well, there is nowhere decent at Star & Garter to lock a bike and the security at Rebellion do start to look at you suspiciously when you disappear and reappear outside for a fourth time. But most importantly I got to experience two stellar but radically different gigs, I may try multi-tasking again.