Anaal Nathrakh, Akercocke & Agrona, Thekla, Bristol
Sundays are generally seen as a day of rest but peace, quiet and restfulness was the last thing you would find in Bristol on this Sunday evening as a trio of UK extremity hit the Thekla. This promised to be a truly vicious evening of music.
Stepping in as a last minute replacement for Burning Vow who had to drop off the bill were South Wales blackened metal horde Agrona (7). I have followed these guys since their inception so I was hugely happy for them that they had managed to bag this support slot being one of the biggest shows they have played to date with a lot of new fans to win over. Unfortunately it seemed that sound issues were going to work against them during their set. Kicking off with I Chose To Burn the guitars were virtually inaudible though as the set progressed adjustments were made and by the time the band were halfway through their set all instruments were audible. The audience did not seem put off by the sound issues as a large crowd amassed in front of the stage and banged their heads along to set staples such as Immaterium, Storm’s End and Summoning The Void.
The first of the evenings co-headliners were London extreme progressive metallers Akercocke (8). Much like Agrona as they started their set the sound was very poor and muddy and much of the drums inaudible apart from the kick drums. The band soldiered on through and the sound vastly improved as the set progressed. Unfortunately frontman Jason Mendonca was unable to perform vocals so the harsh vocals were provided by guest vocalist Sammy Unwin from Employed To Serve whilst clean vocals were provided by keyboard player Sam Loynes and both put in superb performances. This was a very old school leaning set. Latest album Renaissance In Extremis was represented by Disappear and Unbound By Sin but the biggest cheers were for songs such as Horns Of Baphomet, Verdelet, Son Of The Morning, Enraptured By Evil and a very rare outing of Valley Of The Crucified. Whilst it took a couple of songs for the audience to warm up to them soon there was a massive pit and the expected carnage of an Akercocke set.
The final band of the evening were the mighty lords of terror Anaal Nathrakh (7). Anaal Nathrakh kept up the trend of the evening by having absolutely dreadful sound to start with. The sound did also improve for them and whilst it was not particularly good throughout the whole set it was acceptable. The band delivered their unmistakable brand of black metal, grindcore and noisy terror ripping the faces of the audience away with displays of aural carnage such as Obscene As Cancer, Depravity Favours The Bold, Hold Your Children Close And Pray For Oblivion, Forward and Forging Towards The Sunset. The Nathrakh faithful sent out their gnarled screams of approval to older cuts from the discography such as In The Constellation Of The Black Widow, Bellum Omnium Contra Omnes, Between Shit And Piss We Are Born and fan favourite Do Not Speak. The band put in a furious performance with the deranged screams of frontman Dave Hunt being always enjoyable though his clean vocals were very strained throughout the whole set.
This was an astonishingly good line up with two grizzled veterans of the UK extreme metal scene and an up and coming act all laying waste and smashing faces with their performances but sadly all were let down by the poor sound in the venue. No fault of the bands but either an issue with the venue itself or the sound technician.
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