Inferno Festival London

ARCTURUS – RED HARVEST – MADDER MORTEM – GRIMFIST – ENSLAVED
Live at the London Underworld, 27/01/05,
Camden Town, London, England
Live Review & Pictures by Stefanos Zachariadis

ARCTURUS is a very interesting band. Starting up as an all-star black metal band, they released the “My Angel” and “Constellation” E.P.s back in the early nineties. Remember the early nineties? The rise and rule of extreme black metal bands in Norway? Well, ARCTURUS had the guts to start incorporating traditional melody and keyboards and start to do vocal experimentation – things that nowadays we take for granted. 1995's “Aspera Hiems Symphonia”, the full length debut of ARCTURUS, is a record that no black metaller should be without. A record that set the standard for future black metal releases, it is relentless in its ferocity and astounding in its beauty. It was 1997s “La Masquerade Infernale” (which is one of my favorite records of any genre), however, that really shocked the scene. ARCTURUS presented us with an avant garde and theatrical black metal release, which mixed an incredibly different number of styles, including black metal (of course), drum-n-bass, trip-hop, experimental industrial etc. The result was a release that intensely haunts you with its mental imagery and beauty. Then it all went quiet for a long while. 2002 saw the release of ARCTURUS' most recent record, “The Sham Mirrors”. When we reviewed it, we concluded our review by saying that

“

The Sham Mirrors was composed to be part of heavy metal’s new generation elite.

”

And it was – the record was a step up from “La Masquerade Infernale”, resulting in more experimentation, intense melodies and rhythms, and imageries that grabbed you from the throat and never let you go.

ARCTURUS has also featured some of Norway's most famous musicians. Krystoffer Rygg (ULVER), Ihsahn (EMPEROR and many more), Samoth (EMPEROR and many more) have all left their marks in ARCTURUS. Oh, and people like Hellhammer (MAYHEM, COVENANT, and so many more) Steinar Sverd Johnsen (COVENANT) etc. form the current lineup.

It was an incredible opportunity, therefore, to see the ever-elusive ARCTURUS live for the first time – it is after all, a band that doesn't do many lives. Moreover, as we reported earlier on, ARCTURUS would debut their new singer, Simen Hestenaes (DIMMU BORGIR) at the venue. And not only that, but ARCTURUS would be supported by RED HARVEST (reviewed here), ENSLAVED (whose ISA was the best album I heard last year) and the awesome GRIMFIST. Oh they were also supported by MADDER MORTEM, which is a band about whom I was totally unfamiliar – I will not comment very much on them in this text.

Do you notice something strange with this lineup? Why, oh why are ENSLAVED, one of the primordial (sort of) black metal bands playing first? Well, in the original lineup they were supposed to play directly before ARCTURUS – but that changed. Rumour has it that their drummer had to leave early for a fishing trip. What a big shame though....

As I left home to go to Camden Town, my mind was racing. How would ARCTURUS be without Krystoffer on the vocals? How would they ever live up to the expectations that everyone has off their brilliance?

I arrived slightly late at a sold out venue, at around 10 minutes past 6, thanks to the expensive wonder that's called the London Underground (really appreciate your efforts in making my life difficult guys!) . I was given a piece of paper with a number on it, to which i didn't pay any attention, because ENSLAVED were already on stage (they were supposed to start at 6), and I bet that a lot of people missed them, because of the line up change. What a shame – but if the drummer had to leave early, then, what can you do i suppose.

When I arrived, ENSLAVED were well into ISA and were getting a great reaction from the crowd. What amazed me was the incredibly good sound – especially for a black metal band. Very crisp and powerful, ENSLAVED played an amazing 45 minute set, that included a lot of ISA (ISA, Return to Yggrasill, Violet Dawning and more), plus a few songs from their previous releases. Unfortunately, I'm not very familiar with those, so I can't give you any tracknames. A very intense and powerful performance, but no encore.

After about 15 minutes or so, GRIMFIST came on stage. It's actually quite funny, if you think about it, when people do soundcheck for a black/death metal band. So the guy came on stage, started growling on the microphone and that was it :-) GRIMFIST played for about 45 minutes, playing a large part of their debut and only album, “Ghouls of Grandeur”. Although they had some problems with their bassist at the beginning and the singer did seem slightly wasted and shy, it all worked out well in the end and they gave a killer performance, that induced a lot of headbanging. They ended up with “Moshpit Underground”, which was repeatedly requested by the crowd. A great performance from a great and very hopeful band. They didn't do any encore either. A choice quote from the singer: “Live like it's your last day, make great music, treat everyone as if they're your fuckin' family). Well said.

After another 20 minutes, then MADDER MORTEM came on. As I said, I don't really know them, so I can't comment. They were OK I suppose, a “Draconian Times”-era PARADISE LOST-type band (sort of), fronted by a woman. They also played for 45 minutes or so with no encore.

After 30 or so minutes, RED HARVEST came on. I've never been very impressed with the band. I find them a bit noisy and boring. They played their industrial and noise -themed black metal for about 1 hour. The performance was reasonably uneventful, although the crowd seemed to love them. I particularly liked the fact that the singer/guitarist played guitar with one hand (just plucking the chords, without pressing on any different note on the head of the guitar) for a significant amount of time. Errr, interesting.

So after that, everybody was getting pretty psyched up for ARCTURUS. It was about 10:15pm – reasonably late for UK standards. We waited. And waited. And waited. And waited. For a LONG time for the stage to get set up. At around 10:45, instead of ARCTURUS... the editor of Terrorizer magazine came on stage. We were all puzzled as to why we would care. Well, it seems that Mr. Terrorizer & co had decided to turn this amazing event into a carnival and one huge ad. So the guy actually raffled (so that's what the paper with the number on it was) an inferno festival t-shirt (you know, the ones that you could buy inside the venue), an official MAYHEM ashtray, adorned with skulls (WHAT THE FUCK? AN OFFICIAL MAYHEM ASHTRAY? ARE YOU FOR FUCKIN REAL? I mean, what's next? EMPEROR-themed school pens and erasers? A GEHENNA lipstick? WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE?) which was very classy, obviously, and a ticket to the three-day Inferno festival in Norway (the lineup to which he announced). Needless to say, he wasn't well received – He was repeatedly jeered at, had water and beer thrown at him and received an applause whenever he said that “ARCTURUS are coming, I just need to say these and then I'll get the fuck out”. Bastard. Anyway, maybe I'm bitter because I didn't win anything but I doubt it.

After this comic event, ARCTURUS came on stage. Problem was, that a lot of people had to leave at that stage to catch the busses/trains etc. that they needed to get home, as there were people from all over the UK and Europe there. I'm sure that the people that missed ARCTURUS would like to thank Mr. Terrorizer for that. Bastard.

So at around 11:15 or thereabouts, ARCTURUS came on stage. And we were all stunned. You can see how important ARCTURUS is; after only 3 full length albums, with the last album coming out almost three years ago, ARCTURUS manage to headline a sold-out festival and captivate the audience. But I digress. ARCTURUS were absolutely brilliant. It seems that ARCTURUS without Krystoffer is possible - Simen was very impressive, giving a captivating and extremely melodic, theatrical and powerful performance, that spanned all three ARCTURUS releases, with a minor focus on “La Masquerade Infernale”. Hellhammer (drums) is an amazing experience live. Great sound, great set, which included classics such as “To thou that dwellest in the night”, “Alone”, “The Chaos Path”, “Ad Absurdum” and many more (although they did exclude my favourite, “Ad Astra”). The crowd was spellbound by an incredible performance and ARCTURUS were interacting with us. Áfter a bit less than an hour, ARCTURUS exited the stage. We all called, again and again for about 7 minutes or so and the lights were kept off. So we all hoped that they would do an encore. But it was not to be. Thanks to a 12:00 curfew and the wonderful Mr. Terrorizer, we had run out of time. So no more ARCTURUS. Thanks Mr. Terrorizer!

It's been a while since I banged my head so hard or that I've been amazed by a group so much. If ARCTURUS are playing within 200KM of where you live, drive, walk or crawl there. It's worth it.

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