With the recent release of “Metanoia”, Fear of Domination clearly had something to celebrate. They organized several shows within Finland to party together with their fans, on Friday 11 May, they took a stop at Nosturi, Helsinki and we were there to witness.
Supporting the band were My Favourite Nemesis and High School Dropouts. Both of the acts were so different from Fear of Domination that I at first didn’t quite understand why they had placed these bands together. It seems like it’s all a matter of having the right energy. Both of the support bands were young and had each of their difficulties and challenged to overcome, but they managed to deliver a really energetic performance. My Favourite Nemesis played some pretty standard metalcore, the band has a bright future ahead. I especially like the vocalist’s guttural vocals. Sometimes there seemed to be a bit of a tuning problem with the backing vocals, however, their overall performance and attitude made up for that. The only song “Last Goodbye” that I managed to take a video of with my phone, was also my personal favorite. In this song the full potential of the band becomes really clear.
High School Dropouts were surprising us by punk rock covers back from the early 2000s, think Sum 41, Good Charlotte, Blink 182, The Offspring. This little trip down to memory lane, was very entertaining. There seemed to be a lot of technical difficulties within the performance, but the band had the attitude of not giving a rat’s ass about that. Perhaps their playing wasn’t super tight due too all the technical difficulties, but sure as hell an award should go to the vocalist’s attitude, jumping on and off the stage to entertain the crowd. And the latter one was so enthusiastic about the songs and the music, that they couldn’t even deny participating cheerfully in a circle pit. High School Dropouts made me realize why these bands were chosen to play before Fear of Domination they all have that crazy energy that makes you feel all warm inside, which is perhaps the only thing they really have in common with the band. But as far as it comes down to it, it sure means that everyone was warmed up alright for Fear of Domination to enter the stage.
And then it was finally time for Fear of Domination, I had to multitask quite a bit during the first three songs, so I had a bit of issues with concentrating, however I was blown away by that instant immense energy from the stage. Because switching from video to photography was a bit of a hassle and I am not ready yet to share my video footage with the world, I decided for the time being to share these gifs of the show, works out fine, because it provides immediately a great context of how the band performs. You can see the instant explosions just by looking at the footage. Moving, jumping, kneeling, no movement is banned from the stage, including a drummer that is not too shy to dive into the crowd. Like I said, during the first time I had seen the band I was left stunned with a good impression. This time around, it was their own evening, their headlining show to promote their new album “Metanoia”.
The release of their new album causing happiness, really was clear in watching the band play live. Somehow the show felt even more bombastic, maybe the bigger stage also had to do something with that. The band played through “Metanoia” and even though the album had only been out for a couple of days, a lot of the audience already seemed to know the lyrics.
When I wrote the review about the album, I ended the review with stating that I couldn’t wait to hear these songs being played live. And I was right. The album was great, but the songs are even more explosive in the combination with perceiving the enthusiasm of these performers. Songs like “Obsession”, “Sick and Beautiful” and “We Dominate” are excellent songs to, as an audience, let yourself go wild!
The climax of the show for me was the moment when the band started playing “Ruin”. During an interview earlier that day, vocalist Saku Solin talked about how he is so energetic, and admits that he is doing everything for his fans. I didn’t understand the true meaning of those words, until he jumped into the photo pit and engaged with the front rows. The music clearly brought him to other atmospheres and so did it with the rest of us present. That in combination with Sara Strömmer‘s voice and the atmosphere created by everything else, keys, bass, guitars, drums. Everything just fell into place and I don’t think I was the only one who experienced some goosebumps there.
After they played “Metanoia”, the gig wasn’t over yet. The band played through some of their old songs, all successful. All the fans were shouting along and I realized that even though the venue wasn’t filled (this might be explained by the fact that Metallica and some other bands were playing simultaneously the same night) it sure felt like it. This became especially clear during the last song of the evening “Fear of Domination”. This perhaps was also definitely my personal highlight. Somehow the energy that the audience had was as contagious as the band’s attitude. I seldom have seen a more enthusiastic crowd who are committed until the very end of the show. When Saku Solin let the crowd shout “Fear of Domination”, I felt as if there were thousands of people present, while in reality there weren’t.
Finland offers many great metal bands, but Fear of Domination is surely one of the country’s best live bands. They throw theirselves into their concerts as if it’s going to be their last night on earth. Their shows are explosive, but also can have intimate moments and surely will offer you a great night out. I can only recommend to look out for these guys whenever they hit your town.
Setlist
1. Dance with the devil
2. Obsession
3. Face of Pain
4. Sick and beautiful
5. Shame
6. Lie
7. We Dominate
8. The Last Call
9. Mindshifter
10. Ruin
11. Primordial
12. Adrenaline
13. El Toro
14. II
15. Legion
16. Paperdoll
17. Pandemonium
18. Fear of Domination
