Earthship (5/10)
Start 17:00 / End 17:30
Earthship is a German band, which proposes an ordinary show of Stoner and Sludge Metal. It didn’t impress me as opener of Crowbar the last year and it achieved the same result this time. Some doubts arise concerning about the double voice: the screamed vocal part results good, but the clean one needs to be reinvented. Earthship made its job and nothing more. It can surely do better than that.
Lo! (7/10)
Start 17:45 / End 18:15
Lo! comes from Australia and this was its first time playing live in Berlin. They offered a terrific half hour of Hardcore Sludge, which slapped with no pity the audience’s faces. Lo! was a great surprise and it deserves to be closely followed, waiting for the next live appearance in Berlin. There is the need for someone who can take the place of bands such as Botch or Breach, and Lo! could be one of the possibilities.
Abraham (7/10)
Start 18:40 / End 19:10
Abraham is a Swiss band, who seems to love slaughtering goats on the mountains in its free time (only metaphorically), judging from the music the band played. Said music was really amazing: just try to image a successful fusion between Sludge and Atmospheric Black Metal. The double voice added something special to Abraham’s show, and everybody was impressed by the performance. You should give a listen to Abraham, if the band were new to you. No regrets, just fun!
Kruger (8/10)
Start 19:25 / End 20:00
Kruger comes from Switzerland as well, and it was another great surprise of this festival. Its music is more oriented to Metalcore, and the main reference coming to mind when listening to Kruger could be Converge, whose guitarist, Kurt Ballou, gave a helping hand for the realization of Kruger’s latest album. Nevertheless, the band’s style results personal and fresh. The proposed show was full of positive energy and high intensity: the crazy frontman didn’t stop jumping everywhere on stage for a second, and he went among the audience more than once, kissing the people there, embracing them and drinking beer from their glasses. Write down this band’s name and go see Kruger live as soon as you can!
EF (6/10)
Start 20:25 / End 21:10
EF from Sweden plays a sort of Post-Metal, accompanied by melodic clean vocals. Although the result is quite interesting, it was hard for me to digest it after Kruger. However, I have to admit that EF offered an intense high-quality show, and most people in the audience loved it, singing along almost every song. I’ll try again to listen to EF under different circumstances, I know it’s worth it.
Khoma (6/10)
Start 21:45 / End 22:30
Khoma comes from Sweden too, and it proposed something melodic as well, exactly like its “cousin” EF before. The band features two guitarists of Cult of Luna, and this show was an exclusive one for the band in 2013. The expectation was high, but in the end Khoma plays just Post-Rock. Surely well played, with the right attitude and offering a good performance, but Khoma doesn’t add anything to the already overcrowded scene.
The Ocean (8/10)
Start 22:50 / End 24:05
The Ocean from Germany co-headlined the festival, therefore it plays at home as atmosphere lets understand. Its Post-Hardcore, added of always more influences coming from Progressive Metal was at its best: great work at drums and guitar, powerful vocals, although able to modulate, clear sound and a widescreen portraying sub-marine imagines projected above the band. The show was the launch of the band’s brand new album and everything needed to go smoothly and at its best. So it did, and everybody enjoyed the great performance. After giving an encore The Ocean left the stage, aware of being loved and of having done a great job.
Cult of Luna (8/10)
Start 24:45 / End 02:15
No words for Cult of Luna. If this band was the headliner of a festival of such a high quality, there was a reason. Go check the venue, it is probably still trembling. I hope you can enjoy the pictures, and try to imagine what kind of atmosphere it was.
Venue: C-Club
Price: 26,45€ at Trinity Music
Setlist: Cult of Luna
Berlin, 10.05.2013
Advertisements
Hey 🙂 Nice report! You inverted Khoma and EF. Khoma was the post-metal one with clean vocals, and EF was the post-rock / indie one with lots of keys and samples. Cheers 🙂
Xavier
Agreed with most of the points.
COL still deserved 10/10. Incredible performance!
Agreed, 10/10 from me for Cult of Luna as well.
The Ocean Post-Hardcore? …. c’mon people should stop tagging bands, seriously… if you’ve ever digged in The Ocean’s discography, you should know by now they don’t respond to any specific tag… and post-whatever is the least apealing… En fin…
Thanks for the pics and the report! And yes you mixed up Khoma and EF…
Cult of Luna was intense again! They manage to create a very emotional special atmosphere.
Re The Ocean, I agree with Bantera. If you need to tag them it should include progessive, technical metal with elements of classical music or so.
For me Khoma is just post-rock, and not the better one. I had doubts about EF, despite the clean vocals, I found their sound pretty powerful, to indicate it as just post-rock. This clears why “a SORT of post-metal with clean vocals”. But just my opinion, it´s a free music world 🙂
Cult of Luna’s performance smashed them all in my opinion!! 100/10!!!
[…] Naglfar and Refused) is now touring in Europe, hitting again Berlin after the headliner show at the Pelagic Festival the last year in the same venue Columbia Club. Who attended that show, knows what a Cult Of Luna performance […]