Gig Reports
How good is it when something unexpected turns into something great that you are so glad you experienced? So, Thursday night, I have been in Glasgow for 2 days just doing touristy things. I ended up in a pub on the Great Western Road, having a pint, watching the football on the television.
Some people at the next table were talking about a band they were going to see, my ears pricked up when they mentioned hardcore. Now I’m not the greatest hardcore punk fan but have learned to appreciate it more as I get older.
I googled the band they were talking about and saw that the venue they were playing in was a few hundred yards down the road, what the hell, I got nothing better to do, I decided to go along, a very wise decision as it turned out!
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Have you ever experienced seeing a band multiple times before things click, and you suddenly start liking them? I’ve had this with Turmion Kätilöt. Needless to say, I was excited to finally see them with different eyes. On this part of the Finnish tour of their album ‘Omen X’, released on January 13th last year, they are supported by Sigh from Japan and Marianas Rest from Finland. A very diverse choice, it promises to become an interesting evening.
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Two mastodons of the metal scene joining forces to take over venues all over Europe is something we usually don’t let pass us by. So when modern metal giants Amaranthe and power metal titans Dragonforce announced their massive co-headline tour, we knew we had to experience what was sure to be quite the spectacle. So off we went on a Saturday night to Helsinki’s Black Box in the Ice Hall venue…
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Cradle Of Filth being on a massive European tour is bringing a lot of people out of their houses and into venues, including myself. But what got me even more excited about this tour, is that the special guest was no other than Wednesday 13 playing only Murderdolls era music! And as support the Italian aliens of Sick N’ Beautiful and US industrial band Drift, it was quite the package! Sadly, due to another wintry assault in Finland, public transport experienced quite some delays, and by the time we managed to get our passes and into the venue, we were able to just catch the last few notes of the first band.
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A progressive giant like UK’s Tesseract dropping by in your neighborhood while they’re on a massive tour to celebrate their latest album ‘War of Being’, should be reason enough for you to get outside. Add to that the German Unprocessed and the US mathcore misfits of The Callous Daoboys and you know you can’t sit this one out! And we clearly were not alone in that sentiment, because Helsinki’s legendary rock club Tavastia was absolutely packed!
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“Come On Come On
Come On Come On
Come On Come On
Antifa hooligans”
The chant was echoing round the room at the end of the gig, a day and a half later it’s still embedded in my head and I can’t stop singing it! I imagine it is pretty much the same for everyone else who was there.
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Despite being a very popular metal band overall, somehow Avatar hasn’t been performing in Finland all that much. After last year’s successful opening of Tuska 2023, the organisation behind the festival found it to be time to get “The Great Metal Circus” to the country for a handful of Finnish dates. No way we were going to miss out on that! So off we went to a sold-out Tavastia in Helsinki on a Thursday night…
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It is quite unsettling when you haven’t seen an artist in decades and instead of the lithe young troubadour of days gone by that you recall, you get a plumpish man in silver trousers, black shirt, white loafers and hat with feather in it.
I guess it kind of reminds you that you yourself may look a little different due to the merciless ravages of passing time. It comes to us all.
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Demolition 23. are back and they are here to show what a true rock ‘n’ roll show is. This unit only released one album in 1994 with a lot of critial acclaim, achieving legendary status that still stays almost 30 years later. Michael Monroe, Sami Yaffa, Nasty Suicide from the original Hanoi Rocks and Karl Rockfist from Monroe’s band in place for Jimmy Clark, played to a massive sold out crowd in the heart of Helsinki, Tavastia club, which has a lot, a lot of history with these Hanoi Rocks legends and of course the band Demolition 23. itself.
Well how was it? Can these living legends still deliver? Yes and then some. They delivered a spectacle, a true rock ‘n’ roll show and maybe the best show I’ve seen all year.
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