Nile - Immolation -
Krisiun - Dreaming Dead
Jan 30th 2010
Slim's, San Francisco, CA, USA
This brutal bill started out with the band Dreaming Dead, whom I had
never heard of before. The band was mostly a thrash act with some blast
beats and black metalish vocals. The first thing of note was the band
had two women in it, one of which was the lead guitar and vocalist.
They did a decent job, but their guitar sound had way too much echo,
and so it was tough to really hear any of the music. Maybe their CD is
better, but live I felt they were just so-so.
Next came Krisiun, and their sound was far better. Of course, it helps
when you only have a single guitar, clarity is much easier to achieve.
They proceeded to play some great songs from various albums, like
'Vicious Wrath' and 'Hatred Inherit'. The band was tight. Alex's banter
between songs was decent, he probably had the best stage presence of
the evening. My only knit was that Max's bassdrum sound was too quiet,
and so it blended in with everything else. For a band where the
bassdrum is so central to their sound, it needed to be louder.
Next was Immolation. Immolation is one of those classically underrated
bands, they never seem to get much of the limelight, and yet they are
such a great band. They performed pretty much 1 song from all their
albums, especially noteworthy was 'Father, You're Not a Father' (but
that may just be because it's off my favorite album of theirs). They
also played 'I Feel Nothing', 'World Agony', 'Passion Kill', and the
new single, 'The
Purge', off their forthcoming album. Their sound was excellent, tight
even with the two guitars. I just love the oddness to their music, the
guitar riffs are very dissonant, and the drumming manages to keep a
beat while not really playing a beat, somehow the constant fills merge
together into a consistent backbone for the rest of the music. No one
sounds like this band, and they had an amazing set. Also, it's so much
fun watching lead guitarist Robert Vigna move around on stage, that guy
is a total spazz, thrashing the neck of his guitar around, doing these
huge upstrokes, I swear, the man doesn't move in a human manor, and
it's really fun to watch. Maybe he's channeling some sort of demon as
he plays :)
And then Nile hit the stage. Even with such strong sets from Krisiun
and Immolation, Nile definitely ruled the night. Their sound was by far
the best, with insanely machine gun like drumming from George, and a
really good mix that allowed each instrument to be heard clearly but
still hit with a lot of power (It almost sounds as good as their studio
mix). Sadly I spent a lot of time in the
balcony, which didn't have as strong a sound as being on the floor, but
the times I was on the floor, you could really feel the drums in your
chest. The moment the band started, I was surprised, Dallas (guitar /
vocals)
has shaved his head? At first I didn't think it was him, maybe they had
a fillin guitar player, but quickly I
realized he had just made the decision, he was going bald and decided
to accept his fate. A few songs for the evening: 'Ithyphallic', 'Black
Seeds Of Vengeance', 'Serpent Headed Mask', 'Cast Down The Heretic',
'Lashed To The Slave Stick', 'Execration Text', and the ever popular
'Papyrus Containing the Spell to Preserve Its Possessor Against Attacks
From He Who Is In the Water'. They opened the set with new song
'Kafir!', and also played 'Hittite Dung Incantation' and '4th Arra Of
Dagon' off their latest album. A few small knits, first, Dallas needs
to work on his banter. Almost all of his banter was saying "Now we're
gonna play a song off of album X, Do you want to hear a song off of
album X?" Then the next one is "Now we're gonna play a song off of
album Y, Do you want to hear a song off of album Y?" He definitely
needed more variety. Next, no encore, which was a letdown, I'd have
loved to hear a couple more songs. And finally, they didn't play my
favorite song off the new album ('Utterances Of The Crawling Dead') and
they didn't play my favorite song off their last album ('What May Be
Safely Written'), but that's just a personal knit, since I'm sure those
aren't everyone's favorite songs.
Really great concert, Nile is just devastating live, Immolation played
a surprisingly strong set, and Krisiun did their usual strong set.
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