Bolt Thrower & Incantation & Morgoth, Backstage, Munich, 9-26-2014, sold out, 1300 spectators

Three classics of Death Metal during one evening! What a crowd and what an expectation, because Bolt Thrower just played a few gigs at chosen festivals in Germany, like Party.San-Festival in 2008, RockAera-Festival in 2009, Metalfest in 2010 and some more. So most of the spectators came to Munich just to see Bolt Thrower.

The Concert kicks off at 8pm with Incantation, one of the pioneers of classic US-Death Metal. No song and no announce could be recognized due to the guttural grunts of John McEntree, the “vocalist” and the man on “rhythm guitar”. It´s in brackets because there was no chant, no clear guitar sound, no structure during the songs, just destroying blastbeats, ultra-slow breakdown-parts, comparable with Cannibal Corpse, Suffocation or Morbid Angel. The slower parts had more common with Doom-Metal à la Cathedral. Anyway, after half an hour, the gig got boring and we suffered 15 minutes more until this concert was over.

The music between Incantation and the following german Death Metal-Pioneers Morgoth - Iron Maiden, Killers - was a remedy for our ears.

Morgoth entered the stage and another hour of simple and classic Death-Metal started. After three songs the sound problems disappeared and Morgoth started for a ride through their musical history. The band played mostly songs from their debut and also some new songs, which also sounded quite old-school. The audience cheered quite friendly, because the people simply waited for Bolt Thrower. The lights on stage were just crap, I thought, it was the lights for the support, but also the following Bolt Thrower had that crappy light.

Setlist Morgoth

1. Cursed

2. Body Count

3. Exit to Temptation

4. Suffer Life

5. Sold Baptism

6. God is Evil

7. Under the Surface

8. Resistance

9. White Gallery

10. Die as Deceiver

11. Burnt Identity

12. Isolated

13. Pits of Utumno

Finally, after two hours of mediocre music, the band for all the people waited for, entered the stage with their opening hymn “Battle for Britain” and all the barriers broke down as the band entered the stage and started their set with the song “War”.

1300 people finally moved themselves, the first circle pits and crowdsurfers appereared, the band was banging, a massive and clear sound during 1,5 hours of this special kind of Death Metal poured through the venue, the music was much more slower and heavier than from Morgoth or Incantation, groovy like a rolling bulldozer or tank in the battlefield, very unique. Nothing special happened on the stage during the next 1,5h, a few announcements by Karl Willet and just this massive, brutal sound and the mainly slow and crushing parts. My personal highlight was the “IVth Crusade”, with this simple opening riff and the army of powerchords, galloping drums and effective breaks.

It took time to appreciate “Bolt Thrower” and their kind of Death Metal, but the fact, that I did my first look on the watch during the first encore, showed me, what a great concert it was.

Despite the light.

1. Battle for Britain Theme

2. War

3. Remembrance

4. Mercenary

5. World Eater

6. Cenotaph

7. Anti-Tank (Dead Armour)

8. Warmaster

9. Where Next to Conquer

10. This Time It's War

11. The IVth Crusade