Sara Hammerzmith

So the day was here! It feels like I start a lot of my entires with that, but this was one of the shows I was a bit excited about. As the name states, this is a tour that consists of 100% female fronted bands from all over the world -Malta, Ukraine, United Kingdom, Canada and the United States. Personally, the bands I looked the most forward to was Kobra and the Lotus and Butcher Babies, but it was going to be an amazing evening nonetheless. It’s a little sad a tour like this needs to exist, but that is a different discussion.

So, around 12ish we finally got in the car and started the four hour long drive toward Belgium and Biebob. It was a long, but still fun drive. A few stops along the way – France is so superior to Sweden when it comes to stops for toiletbreaks – and we made it to the venue about half an hour ish before they opened. Perfect time, no?

We went to the pizzaplace next doors to have some quick dinner before getting in line for the show. We got ourselves good spots on top of the plateaus, giving us a nice view over the stage as the first band took the stage. We were both utterly tired, to the point of extermination of our existance, but somehow we were gonna make this work.

MartYriuM

Martyiriam, a Maltese band (!) was first out on stage. With their melodic black metal music and atmospheric performance, they put on an amazing show! The music isn’t exactly my cup of tea, but the show itself was great.

Ignea

Second band of the evening was Ukrainian band Ignea. I must say, not bad to see TWO bands from countries I don’t think I’ve ever come across a band from before, all in the same night! The band performs a semi-symphonic progressive kind of metal with folk and oriental elements to their music. Performed a very good set too, thank you!

Skarlett Riot

Third band of the night was United Kingdom based Skarlett Riot. The band put on a really good and energetic show, I loved the energy from Chole, their singer. It was something else! Thank you so much.

Kobra and the Lotus

So, after the three aforementioned bands, one out of two headliners of the night entered the stage. I’ve seen Kobra and the Lotus before, twice in fact, as openers for Delain on their Moonbathers tour in 2016. I was really looking forward to see them again, especially since I’m pretty weak for Kobra Paige as a front woman.

The band put on a really good show. Seriously, they are such a pros? The show was energetic, the crowd was going and just over all very very enjoyable. I loved every minute of it.

Butcher Babies

So, the highlight of the evening for me was Butcher Babies of course. I couldn’t even for the life of me remember where and how I found out about them, but then it hit me that I saw a recap of Knotfest and there was a brief moment of them – and its from there it goes.

They came on stage and opened the show energetically with “Korova”. And the crowd loved it. “Burn the Straw Man” was next on the list, quickly followed by “Monsters Ball”. And here things started to just not go well.

The “issue” with bands like Butcher Babies and their likes is that they attract a crowd that just doesn’t know how to fucking behave. That honestly think that moshpits are for fighting, and thus ruines everything for everyone by just existing. That was so sad to see.

“The Butcher” was next on the list, until a little bit of a pleasant surprise appeared. “Headspin”, my favorite song off “Lilith” was the next song, and it was just sooo good and so energetic. That is something I’ll really give Carla and Heidi – those two frontwomen have some mad energy while on stage.

“Grim Sleeper” and “The Huntsmen” followed suit, and later “POMONA”. The energy was still on top!

“Dead Man Walking” off “Take it like a Man” was next on the list, followed by “Gravemaker” and “Oceanea”.

And then, they were set to perform “They’re Coming to Take me Away” – with a twist. They invited all of the singers from the previous bands – throwing the song between them all, making this even more epic than when they invited Henrik from Amaranthe to perform it with them.

They wrapped up the show with “Lilith”, “Look What We’ve Done” and my personal favorite “Magnolia BLVD” before thanking for this time, and the tour  – this was the finale – and then leaving the stage.

It was a really good show. I guess I wasn’t too surprised, I know they are very good and crazy on stage, and today was no exception really.

After the show, I took a quick stop by the merch to pick up a Kobra and the Lotus patch. Earlier in the night I had purchased Skarlett Riots album, which I kept in my bra the entire evening. I mean, you heard of phones in bras, but have you ever heard of keeping an album in the bra? Well now you did. I did what I had to do to protect it.

After the show, we said good bye to our friends and just headed back home to Paris. Laura is a fucking trooper for driving this whole and long distance despite being a bit sick, thank you so so much for this Laura!

And thank you all the bands and people involved in this evening, you are the best!

// Sara

This entry was posted on October 21, 2018 at 5:12 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.