Unbelievably this was my seventh time seeing Testament, which means they are now my sixth most seen band of all time. Admittedly three of those seven have been gigs where Testament supported other bands... and one time headlining a festival in London; so it's not like I've purposely seen them that many times and they've never really been a favourite band of mine. Truth be told I probably wouldn't have gone to see them on their own this time, nor Obituary, or Destruction come to that... but put them all together in one package and it made a lot more sense. Plus Obituary were mainly playing songs from their second album 'Cause of Death' which is one that I am reasonably familiar with.
I left work at 4:30pm, thinking I would be in plenty of time, but after a torturous journey through previously uncharted areas of Birmingham (with the sun blinding me for most of it) I eventually found myself in the maze that is central Birmingham, missing turnings and tunnels left right and centre and gradually getting grumpier and grumpier. Finally my phone told me to turn into this dodgy looking alleyway and around two more corners and there before me was the car park. Hallelujah.
Except it looked shut, with roller doors down behind the barriers. Fuck! Where was I going to park now? I stopped in the middle of the road, much to the driver in the car behind me's annoyance I'm sure! Unsure what else to do, I turned into the entrance and the machine offered me a ticket. When I took it the barrier raised and the roller door slowly trundled upwards too. Maybe a sign would be a good idea for people who don't know? FFS.
Anyway, I left the car and made my way down the stairs with the painful sound of an alarm ringing in my ears down all three flights of stairs (a portent of things to come perhaps!) and out onto the street. Now, because this is an 02 venue you don't have a proper ticket or even an email ticket, no you have to use the stupid fucking app. And, exactly as I knew it would, the bastard thing had signed me out! So I had to stand out on the pavement, cursing under my breath. Fortunately I had tested to make sure I knew what my password was earlier in the day, but given I was already grumpy this was the last bloody thing I needed. I don't know how often it signs you out but it's a bit weird that it does it right before you want to use it when I must have been signed in for weeks!
So I went inside and realised that I had been here before, a couple of times actually, albeit twenty years ago (to see Nightwish and Machine Head). Thankfully attendance was a bit lower tonight and so the problem of the wide, low balconies blocking the view didn't mean that we were packed in like sardines. Actually, it was the perfect number of people for the size of the venue, meaning it felt well-attended, but not crowded.
As I arrived Nervosa were already on stage, I knew absolutely zero about them before I got there so I was a little surprised to see four women onstage playing a sort of clunky retro-thrash/death. Apparently they are from Brazil (I thought they were probably German) and I can't help thinking that if they were blokes then no one would give them a second listen because they are fairly unremarkable. I did quite like a song called Jailbreak, mainly due to the twin guitar parts, but I don't think I'll be investigating too much further there, I've already got more mediocre music than I will ever listen to again.
I watched Nervosa from the back of the venue, but decided to move closer to the stage for Destruction. I moved to the right side and there was plenty of space there, but by Christ it was loud - I mean, obviously I was standing in front of the PA, so durr...
I'd seen Destruction six times already, the last time being at KK's Steel Mill a year or two ago, and they were okay, nothing special. I kinda miss Mike not being there as it really doesn't feel like Destruction anymore without him and I don't really like the way the two guitar players interpret some of the older songs. But still, I was hopeful that it would be a good show and given that the band had been playing 'Infernal Overkill' in full on some of their recent festival appearances, I hoped that at least the set would be leaning in that direction.
Things started well, with the classic 'Curse the Gods' intro tape announcing the band's arrival and while the PA was painfully loud I was enjoying the show. In the end the setlist was only eight tracks long, with three coming from the 80s and only one from 'Infernal Overkill', so that was a bit disappointing. But still it was pretty good and on balance probably a little bit better than the show at KK's Steel Mill.
I was relieved to see the Obituary backdrop appear as the roadies swarmed the stage to make the next changeover. While it was a co-headliner I naturally assumed that Testament would be last on, since to me they are surely the bigger band, but who knows... and while I definitely wanted to see Obituary I wasn't sure how much of Testament I could stomach.
Trevor Peres roadie plugged in his guitar and started playing and there it was, that thick as treacle, heavier than hell guitar sound. Wow. Awesome. I was meant to see Obituary supporting Slayer seven years ago, but due to the wonderful Birmingham traffic we arrived to see the band launch into their final song. I was pissed off about that at the time, but again, if I'd seen them then I probably wouldn't have been here...
Obituary started with a few more recent songs that I didn't know before launching into a selection of tracks from 'Cause of Death'. I had looked at a setlist from a few days before and they had dropped the Celtic Frost cover 'Circle of the Tyrants' from the running order, which I was extremely disappointed about, so I was super happy when John Tardy asked if we wanted to hear some Celtic Frost! The crowd responded with a big pit and a bunch of crowd suffers appearing out of nowhere - good to see these people appreciate Switzerland's finest!
'COTT' was undoubtedly the high point of the set for me, well... the night, let's be honest, which seems a weird thing to say, but Celtic Frost are better than all these bands (at least in their current incarnation) so it makes sense to me. Also, Obituary are not the easiest band to listen to live. Their music is quite samey, and while I enjoyed them, there were times when I felt like I wasn't really paying attention. When they played songs I knew well I was invested, but other times it does come over as a bit... meh.
This all sounds rather negative, I know... but after seeing the number of gigs that I have it's hard to be truly blown away, especially by bands you've seen time and time again. Not that that applies to Obituary of course, but I was never a hardcore 'Obies' fan, or really a true 'Death Metal' fan come to that!
At the start of the night I had been in two minds about Testament. I'd seen them six times already and never been that bothered, so I was debating leaving early and getting to bed at a sensible time, or staying... or staying for the first few songs maybe. I knew they were opening with 'DNR' (which is my favourite song of theirs) so it made sense to at least hang on for that, so that's what I did.
Again the roadies swarmed the stage and Testament's hilariously cheesy skeleton thing was inflated behind the drum kit. I mean, the last time I saw an inflatable onstage it was probably Iron Maiden at the DeMontfort Hall in 1986 and it was only for one song... blowing it up before the band even came on was a bit embarrassing, and then the lights dimmed and the intro rolled...
At least I think 'Fight for Your Right to Party' was the intro tape....
Thankfully, once that stopped we got the proper intro tape and the band launched into the blistering 'DNR', with (jazz) guitarist Alex Skolnick looking distinctly disinterested. I've never felt good about Skolnick being back in the band, because he left after 'The Ritual' to go do his jazz trio and saying that he was never really that into metal. Fuck off and let someone who is into metal play then! Fucking pussy.
We got a short drum solo, which I believed was supposed to follow 'RTS' and I wondered if they'd dropped it from the set already, but no... they played it a few songs later. Wow, well I never thought I would see them play that. It was 10:40 by now and I knew they would have to stop at 11pm, so I figured I would stay until they played 'Electric Crown' and then get out of the car park before the rush.
As the night wore on the previously sparingly deployed pyro became more and more prevalent, maybe they needed to use it up or something? Sometimes it was effective, but after a while it got a bit silly really. Venom did it best on their 1984 Hammersmith show, use each effect only once and go hard!
I enjoyed it, but it was a long show and it was a relief to get back to the car and take the weight off my poor foot, and thankfully the satnav took me directly back to the motorway, without the need for navigating strange parts of Birmingham and the sun in my eyes. The journey home was pretty uneventful and I got home at midnight, had a shower and got straight into bed, my ears still ringing like bastards!
Only seven more gigs left in 2025!
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