Tuska Winter War

So, I was at my second concert, this time Megadeth at the old Jäähalli. It was the first gig of the band's Tour of Duty, and the openers were Ensiferum and Volbeat.


I had listened to Ensiferum a bit before, and they were ok. Cheesy but fun, but then I guess that's what all folk metal is. It was nice to have a frontman speak finnish to the audience, though. Volbeat I didn't listen to that attentively; they were ok, but I would have liked another opener.

But Megadeth? It was, for lack of a better expression... fucking amazing. My only regret is that I wasn't in the field. Even then, it was great though. The setlist was:

Sleepwalker
Take No Prisoners
Wake Up Dead
Skin of my Teeth
Washington is Next
Kick the Chair
In My Darkest Hour
Hangar 18
Gears of War
A Tout le Monde
Ashes in your Mouth
Tornado of Souls
Never Walk Alone... A Call to Arms
Symphony of Destruction
Trust
Peace Sells
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Burnt Ice
Holy Wars... The Punishment Due for You

So, in short, a fantastic setlist. All the old classics, plus five new songs. I really like it when a band supports their new material too; Helloween, in contrast, played only two songs from their new album. Highlights of the show were:

Sleepwalker: The lights go out, the intro to the song starts, then the lights turn on, Dave Mustaine is standing there, and the opening riff comes in. Then the rest of the band enters and the show is on. Daaaamn... Great opener.

Gears of War: "Here's a little politically themed song for you... It's called Gears of War..." Fantastically introduced, and a great song played well. Faded out immediately into...

...A Tout le Monde: In the soft, opening part, the crowd joined in, and lighters appeared from everywhere. Loved this one.

Symphony of Destruction: The most overplayed Megadeth song on the radio, but still fantastic. Crazy headbanging action, initiate!

Peace Sells: Lights went out, and the band left the stage. Then James Lomenzo (bass player) entered, and I knew straight awaywhat was coming. The opening bass line was instantly recognisable, and it didn't take five seconds for me to start headbanging.

Hangar 18: Great song, I loved it, but nothing special to say about this one.

Never Walk Alone: Great headbanging song, 'nuff said.

Holy Wars: This could have been the opener or closer, but it was the closer this time. I had waited the whole show for it, but I sort of guessed it would come last. It was just as good live as I imagined it would be. Included the most furious headbanging from me ever, and was a great finisher to a great show. I left after this in a feeling of bliss.

Here's a short video of one of Dave's speeches:


So, did I like this more than Helloween? Yes and no. The openers were of poorer quality in this concert, and Gamma Ray alone was better than Ensiferum and Volbeat together. However, Megadeth was at the very least as good as Helloween, if not better. I also liked their support of new songs, and the setlist was simply amazing in this one. However, in the end it boils down to the conflict that is ever present in my life: power metal vs. thrash metal. Both have their merits; there was more crowd interaction with Helloween, but the music was perhaps better with Megadeth.

I already have my sights on my next gig: Judas Priest at the same venue on June 3rd. Priest is enough of a legend for me to want to see them, and the tickets come on sale next monday. Only my bank account isn't happy...

My addiction?

I have recently noticed that I am becoming more and more open to new bands. However, though my friends would wish that I would turn outwards, out of metal and into new music genres, my expansion is actually inward, into more and more metal. Some of the newer additions to my music library include Nightwish, In Flames, and Opeth; all quite different bands, yet all undisputably metal.

Even more recently, I have tried two new bands: Ensiferum and Volbeat. Both I listened to simply because they are going to be at the Tuska Winter War concert, and a concert's more enjoyable if you know the artists (though Megadeth is the band I'm going there for). I have found both to be fairly good bands, especially Ensiferum. I liked both enough to properly listen the first songs to the end. I actually prefer getting into bands this way rather than hearing them on the radio, as I tend to pay more attention to it when it comes from my computer.

Ensiferum is a folk metal band, and is therefore quite heavy. They sound sort of epic, though "heroic" is perhaps more appropriate. Their singer's style is somewhat of a crossover between thrash and death metal singing, with some clean vocals mixed in. They have a crunchy yet melodic guitar sound, which brings the heaviness. Their music is quite fast, and usually has a distinct melody on the lead guitar over the rhythm guitar. I'm quite not sure what appeals about their style, or even how much I like the music. On one hand, I find this kind of folk metal fairly cheesy; on the other, the music really is good, and I find the combination of heavy guitars and (semi-)growling vocals hard to resist.

Volbeat is also pretty good, but I'm not quite able to put my finger down on what their music style is. They have crunchy, distorted guitars, but their singer has mainly clean vocals. At points, they sound like rock with just heavily distorted guitars.

I noticed that these both had a trait that appeals heavily to me: heavy, distorted, crunchy electric guitar. It doesn't take much of such a heavenly sound to make me play air guitar almost involuntarily (well, ok, exaggerating a bit, but the point is I like distorted guitar), and these bands provided it. With this, I realised that this is something that appeals to me in almost all metal, no matter the sub-genre. This also explains why I like thrash metal so much: it has heavy, distorted riffing. So, I suppose distorted guitar is my addiction. It would explain a lot of things.