Wednesday, 29 March 2023

A View From The Back Of The Room: Fury & Rites To Ruin (Live Review By Matt Bladen)

Fury & Rites To Ruin, Fuel Rock Club, Cardiff, 25.03.23

In a repeat of a gig from last year, Midlands based heavy rockers Fury (9) and Wales based metal band Rites To Ruin (8) again stormed the Fuel Rock Club stage. Performing to a decent crowd on a night Wales' Football team was also playing showed the draw of both bands.

With their shared history and membership there was a lot of love and camaraderie in the air as Rites To Ruin took to the stage, singer Krissie commanding the stage from moment one, her voice is extremely powerful, even audible when then power cut out towards the end of the set.

The band behind her are more cohesive and skillful each time I see them, the love of performing and teasing each other clear to all. Playing I think all tracks from their 2021 EP there was the newer song all about D&D which is currently very en vogue and we were also treated to a brand new song which bodes well for any new material.

Finishing with a flourish it was a short changeover and time for Fury to show that even the loss of their lead guitar player can't stifle them as Tom Atkinson from Manchester thrahsers was the guest guitarist for these shows until they announce their new permenant axe slinger. Tom is a great player getting several solo opportunities to display his chops..

Again taking their set mainly from The Grand Prize and Born To Sin, they did throw in a few surprises to shake things up with The Prince Of Darkness from The Lighting Dream given an outing, Nyah Ifill taking lead vocals for this track in what maybe part of future direction for the band from what I've seen. The vocals shared by Julian Jenkins and Nyah throughout, but especially on Rock Lives In My Soul.

We also got the excellent ballads Shadows And Dust and Upon A Lonesome Tide which break up the outright rocking but it's songs such as Embrace The Demons, Burnout and It's Rock N Roll that were driven by the drums of Tom (Two Speeds) Fenn and Beck Baldwin's 'Rickenbecky' bass rhythms.

At the encore it was a a surprise cover of Burning Love made famous Elvis Presley that invited some smiles, the hunk o' burning love himself JJ giving it some gusto before the now traditional set closer of Casino Soleil closed the set properly as the punters for the Saturday club night poured in.

Both bands kicked ass on this wet Saturday evening. Good luck to Rites To Ruin in this year's South Wales Metal To The Masses, if there's any justice they'll reach the final. Fury especially played one of the best sets I've seen them do, full of fun and big sing-alongs they're a band that need much more exposure and to start playing bigger rooms asap.

No comments:

Post a Comment