First up are Heriot who take to the stage with a backing track of digital hardcore style bass and crashing noise. The lights go red and they’re ready to go. A moment’s silence and then their vocalist screams “Manchester take a step forward!”. Blimey that woke me up. We soon learn that her piercing scream is actually also her singing voice, and is layered over violent blast-beats and a churning barrage of noise.
Read MoreI fell in love with Gojira back at Bloodstock 2010 and from the moment that I first clapped eyes on them I knew that they were doing something really rather special and that they should be huge, stadium huge. Nearly a decade later it feels that my premonition is finally becoming a reality. Tonight feels like the moment that they transcended into the big league and show that they are the ordained successor to Metallica’s crown. There was something so confident and so masterful about this evening’s performance, very much the hallmarks of a band completely in control of their own destiny. The Apollo is heaving, absolutely heaving and even though they were part of the same touring cycle, there is a clear difference between tonight and their 2017 Manchester Academy show. I had been worried that at the Academy that they were stalling, that the fevered audience reaction that I had expected for a band that had created one of the greatest Metal albums ever (“Magma”) was not materialising.
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