Hatebreed

support Unearth + Twelve Tribes
author KS date 12/11/06 venue Gimle, Roskilde, DEN

I've attended at lot of shows at the old Gimle but this was the first time I attended a show at the new Gimle so I didn't really know what to expect from the venue but what I did know was that at least two of the bands are amazing on record, so I quite expected them to be equally aggressive and fast live. I was right. It wasn't long ago since Hatebreed last performed in Denmark, and a big turnout was expected as their last show proved their dominance of the hardcore genre. Skipping Copenhagen, though, meant that not as many people would show up as Roskilde is quite far away to travel, especially on a Sunday night.

Twelve Tribes

First up was Twelve Tribes. I didn't know this band before other than by name. It was kind of a weird show, since it was very obvious that everyone was waiting to see Unearth and Hatebreed. When the lead singer came on and introduced the band it was like everyone said to each other; "Let's assume the position" and so they did. Ten people up in front, including myself, right below the stage. Then a five meter gap and then the bystanders with crossed arms. Pretty weird indeed. I easily kept my place and the only thing to be afraid of was the vocalists ridiculously long and large dreadlocks swinging everywhere threatening to knock you out. Music- and performance-wise they tore it up pretty good and I liked it, but since I don't really know any of the songs it's hard to go into it further. Twelve Tribes tried hard to impress the audience but to no avail.

5

Unearth

Now it was time for Unearth and I must admit I was a bit naive at this point, since I thought that the audience would also be rather calm during the Unearth set. I was wrong. I was standing right at front when the first screaming guitars blasted out. Two seconds later it all kicked off into a riot. Right behind me a circle pit started and I was hit hard from the side, pushing me about five meters to the left, spilling the beer in my hand all over and from there on it continued to be general moshing breaking into circle pits once in a while when Trevor (vocals) was commanding from the stage.

Now, I didn't really see this but somewhere during the third song, some guy got hit in the head by a drum stick. How the hell it happened I don't know, but they stopped and dragged the guy on stage to apologize. He was bleeding pretty heavily from his nose and had blood all over his face but was still smiling. He got a free t-shirt from the Unearth merchandise stand and seemed rather happy with that.

Unearth tore the place up and during their set you could see Ken (guitar) chugging a beer bong and later him running up and down the side stairs to the stage while playing his wireless guitar. Buz (guitar) was standing right on the edge of the scene with one of his feet on the shoulder of a guy in front while riffing away. At one time between two songs, the drummer got up on his chair standing high above everyone else, making "come on" gestures for then to jump into the air and hit hard on his drums kicking into a new track. Unfortunately the audience wasn't in their best appearance tonight, since it was only about 50-60 people really moshing, having circle pits and doing those ninja moves but I really enjoyed the show.

7

Hatebreed

Then finally it was time for the headliner of the night: Hatebreed. More people came to the front and you could feel the intensity building up by a few notches. Tonight they played with the First Blood front man Carl Schwartz on bass since Chris Beattie who normally plays bass had injured his arm and couldn't play. That didn't matter because the audience went crazy as we where blown through new classics like "This Is Now", "Perseverance", "I Will Be Heard" and "Live For This" and we even got to hear the title track of their first EP released called "Under the Knife", in which Jamey (vocals) proclaimed he wrote the track when he was 17 years old. Hatebreed wasn't as active on stage as Unearth but people got a lot more into the songs and moshed away, and Jamey was excellent at getting people to chant along on the gang hardcore yells. For example, in "Live For This" people were very enthusiastically following Jamey's lead. Almost all through the set Jamey thanked people for showing up on a Sunday, but in the end I'm pretty sure everyone in the audience thanked Hatebreed for coming and didn't care what day it was.

7

Comments
comments powered by Disqus

Legal

© Copyright MMXXIV Rockfreaks.net.