It was grindcore time for one sweaty night at a sold-out On the Rocks, featuring none other than ROTTEN SOUND headlining this show, where the very special guest was represented by Singaporean WORMROT, who just embarked recently on a long series of European dates. The always reliable FEASTEM, together with ACID BURNS, were warming up the crowd.
While many people are still making their way in the venue, ACID BURNS gave a brief yet pretty energetic introduction to the audience as to what to expect. Their death/crust made for a lively start and even though the audience was still a bit shy, things had been slowly improving through the show, paving the way for FEASTEM.
The band led by Petri Eskelinen is always a good choice when it comes to these sort of nights, as they provided some solid entertainment to the now growing crowd. The atmosphere started to heat up and by the time WORMROT hit the stage, the first row was full of people waiting to headbang their brains out (and occasionally launch themselves onto the stage and/or attempt crowdsurfing… which, now that I think about it, is a bit funny to see, since it is prohibited in open air festivals where there is definitely more room for it).
The duo was accompanied by Gabriel Dubko (IMPLORE) on vocal duty for this tour, who does an honest job of it, without taking too much of the spotlight from the rest of the band. The set was obviously mostly focused on the latest and well-acclaimed “Hiss,” as well as the previous “Voices.” The guys’ show literally flew by with good intensity and the excitement of the fans fueled the performance on stage. At some point, some random guy decided to take the spotlight for a while by getting on stage to grab his few moments of fame – and fun – before jumping back into that moving mass of sweaty T-shirts and denim that was now the audience.
After a brief changeover came ROTTEN SOUND‘s turn, with Keijo Niinimaa and the other guys provoking pretty much the same reaction from the audience as the earlier trio. This is the kind of band that can give their best in a club gig setting of this size. In fact, they seemed to be in very good shape and that clearly affected the success of the night. Again, the same story repeated itself, with people getting pretty wild in the front – this time under more watchful scrutiny from the security guy standing next to the stage – and enjoying themselves to the fullest, which is what live music should always be about. A good impression was left also by the newest (and youngest) addition to the band, bassist Matti Raappana, who had his good share of fun as well both with his bandmates and with the audience.
Nearing the end of the show, we went quickly to collect our jackets to avoid the customary bottleneck when leaving a full On the Rocks, so that we could be on our way home without delay. After all, this was still a Thursday night, though clearly a good one, as the happy grin on our faces on the way back could testify.
ACID BURNS
FEASTEM
WORMROT
ROTTEN SOUND
