I saw The Defiled last year on the Murderdolls tour and wasn’t overly impressed, mentally slotting them into the bracket “Shouty noise”. They were a bit better this time around and certainly get full marks for effort. The keyboardist in particular flinging his instrument around in a way that probably made his roadie wince.
Midway through the set the lead singer cheerfully announced that he’d thrown up onstage thanks to some dodgy fish and chips then shortly afterwards the drummer was suddenly festooned in toilet paper.
Even with the added synths and samples I still thought they were a shouty noise but The Defiled seemed to go down well and managed to get a big chunk of the crowd bouncing up and down for their final song, always a good sign.
Alestorm are quite possibly the perfect band to get drunk to.
The world’s leading purveyors of True Scottish Pirate Metal regaled us with their keytar-driven tales of booze, wenches, pirates and more booze, briefly turning The Pyramids into their own personal, disreputable tavern.
The end-of-tour silliness only added to the fun. MC Luchador popped up onstage to deliver a plate of nibbles garnished with a used condom and when the keyboard player pointed out that their drummer had apparently turned into a horse, lead singer Chris shrugged it off “These things happen” he told us casually.
Judging by the amount of tricornes dotted throughout the crowd here were more than a few who’d come specifically to see Alestorm and the buccaneering Scots didn’t disappoint. I’m fairly certain the moshpit all suddenly started doing a jig at one point.
Great fun and afterwards I had this weird urge to drink some rum...
It had been a while since I’d seen Dragonforce - almost ten years in fact - and since then almost the entire lineup has changed, only shredders Herman Li and Sam Totman remaining from the band I saw at the Bloodstock festival in 2003.
And there’s no getting round the fact that if you are allergic to widdly guitars then Dragonforce are really not the band for you. Almost every song has a healthy dose of shredding solos, mostly played at breakneck speed.
At one point a pair of acoustic guitars appeared onstage and silly me, I thought that might indicate a ballad was on the cards.
Nope.
Sam and Herman launched into the warpspeed acoustic intro to “Through the Fire and the Flames” before normal service was resumed and the guitars got cranked up again.
Interestingly the anthemic "Cry Thunder" is by, Dragonforce standards, practically a dawdle, and I'd be interested in seeing if that's a direction the band pursue further.
They can't get any faster surely, otherwise somebody's going to lose a finger.
Over the years Dragonforce have picked up a reputation as a sloppy live band but from what I was hearing, that’s really undeserved. The only flaw I could pick up is that new vocalist Marc Hudson got drowned in the mix from time to time. Otherwise he acquitted himself with honour on songs that can’t be easy to sing. Not a bad front man either.
I’m frankly amazed that nobody collided onstage as guitarists, vocalist and bassist roamed every corner of the stage. From time to time even the keyboard player slung a customised keytar round his deck and headed for the front of the stage to join in the fun, this being a band where nobody is content to stand at the back of the stage and blend in.
Then, after the obligatory encore (“Valley of the Damned” from the very first album) the band were taking their final bow and I wandered off into a chill October night, ears hissing and content that my money had been well spent.
Band of the night - Alestorm, just shading it over Dragonforce.
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