It's been roughly a year since I last experienced an evening of hairy arsed metal madness at the Bataclan, surprise tickets for Cannibal Corpse's last European sojourn having been lovingly procured by my other half. Indeed I've taken in my fair share of metal shows in this very venue which seems to have taken pole position as Paris' principal stopover for touring acts from the weightier end of music since La Locomotive got sucked up by the Moulin Rouge a few years back - it's laid out pretty decently for the sort of delirious mayhem that takes place at your average metal gig but all this does beg the question : when are they going to fix the fucking ventilation system in there??? I don't know about you but if I'm going to spend the evening being thrown around the moshpit watching a band with a propensity for setting the stage on fire then I'd quite like to be able to breathe properly while I'm doing it. We can at least count ourselves lucky that the enterprising bar managers haven't cottoned on to the lucrative market in the venue and started selling oxygen canisters alongside their miserly decanted half pints of blonde.
But enough bitching about the venue eh? 35 Euros for a ticket seems like quite a bit for a concert that you're only likely to catch about half of if you work anything like average office hours but those (un)fortunate enough to be at a loose end at four thirty in the afternoon have already been treated to Svarttjern and Inquisition by the time I roll up after work, the latter apparently putting in a thrilling set of Colombian Black Metal according to the enthusiastic French bloke who we chat to over ciggies later in the evening. In Solitude are well into second gear by that point, their rollicking brand of good time metal sounding infinitely superior to the recorded version I checked out the previous evening. These dudes were probably a Nordic twinkle in their parents' eyes when most of their influences were doing the rounds - there's more than a hint of late 80s Swedish Doom-mongers Candlemass in their sound along with the obligatory chunk of Sabbath and even a hint of the brawnier, bluesier end of Whitesnake (they even have a guitarist who's the spitting image of erstwhile Snake axeman John Sykes, perhaps the coolest rock star name of all time). They've got the chops and stage presence to rock much bigger stages than this and the bulk of last year's 'Sister' LP gets an spirited airing as the crowds gather for the evening's main attractions. Put them on mid-afternoon at a festival and they'll do a whole lot more damage.
Poland's Behemoth had already established themselves as arguably Europe's biggest stars on the Death Metal scene prior to frontman Nergal's diagnosis with leukaemia in summer 2010 - initial reports suggested he might not even be around long enough to build on their success but the guy's made of stern stuff and went on to make a full recovery to come back harsher and stronger with this year's stunning 'The Satanist' LP. Flanked by his towering bandmates the Nerg looks tiny but his roar is as ferocious as ever, leading the charge through a thrilling mix of old and new augmented by an elaborate live show packed with smoke torrents, flaming chalices and an avalanche of corrupted religious iconography. They start slow and creepy with some of the more epic sections of the new record before settling into a main course of established classics, the pit-friendly fare of 'Slaves Shall Serve' and 'Christians To The Lions' provoking merry bedlam down the front as energy levels boil to a frantic climax. Cuts from their pre-illness 'Evangelion' LP go down best of all, hailed as defiant classics by the crowd in the face of what's happened since their release and the frontman's status as Death Metal's most inspiring figurehead seems more assured than ever before. The rest of the band hold up their end admirably, tearing through the material with admirable gusto like a bunch of Dothraki warriors who've just had their pints spilled and they conclude a devastating set with a spellbinding performance of 'O Father, O Satan, O Sun' decked out in opaque demonic head dresses before literally disappearing in a cloud of smoke. Other bands on the DM scene may be trading on past glories these days but you can't help but feel that Behemoth are at the peak of their powers right here and now.
Speaking of veteran acts, it's been twenty years since cult UK horror heads Cradle Of Filth released their first torrent of Nun-baiting Black Metal bile and they wisely choose to take advantage of the occasion with a setlist heavily slanted towards their earlier records. Their capacity to shock and thrill may have dulled with the passing of time and frontman Dani seems permanently one wrong move away from descending into outright self parody but savage renditions of classics like 'Funeral In Carpathia' and 'Summer Dying Fast' soon banish doubts and the crowd pile in for a feast of vampiric enjoyment. In the wake of Behemoth's fire and brimstone extravaganza Cradle's stage show looks pretty cheap by comparison, contenting themselves with a video display relaying looped footage of their promo clips like the projector screen in your local Goth club - if they didn't have such decent tunes to back them up you'd be tempted to sneak out to catch the end of the Chelsea game. The slew of oldies provides ample entertainment but does raise the question : where do they go from here? Having coasted through the 90s on a wave of frothing controversy and lurid shock tactics before spending much of the following decade indulging their taste for often laborious flights of fancy, their role in the present day metal scene seems to lack any clear purpose. I remember when these guys seemed genuinely threatening, what with their 'Jesus is a C*nt' T-shirts and flair for PVC-clad debauchery but it's a difficult style to take gracefully into middle age - the nostalgia is fun for now but as the crowd thins out during the latter half of their set you begin to wonder whether their shelf life might be nearing its end. No room for complaints after such a gratifying evening of devilish delights mind you - the masses spew out onto the street thoroughly content with their evening's entertainment and we'll all be back here choking on each other's body odour before too long I shouldn't wonder.
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