GALLERY

GALLERY: 17.5.2025 Steelfest XIII – Day 3 @ Villatehdas, Hyvinkää

July 13, 2025

The last day of Steelfest is always the longest – with the exception of the 10th anniversary year when the festival went on to include Sunday – and as such there was still plenty to be seen here at Villatehdas today. After a very nice lunch including a small treat of Scotch egg (in Hyvinkää of all places!) to ready ourselves before venturing into the festival area, we walked in satisfied and with full bellies. And a survival dose of coffee.

The first was a solo act: perfect to ease the crowd into the day with his black metal/noise project POLTERGEIST, a masked and covered-in-battered-rugs Apparition entertained the audience with his haunted tunes about the paranormal. This was actually quite a nice way to get the day started, pity that there was not yet much of an audience though.

Next on the outdoor stage was FLAME. The guys from Kuopio never disappoint, and they delivered an energetic and fast-paced set, really waking up the increasing crowd gathered in front of the stage. It’s sometimes good to see that some things never change and that this band is steady in their level of performance, which helped set the pace for CURSE UPON A PRAYER.

Showcasing their latest record as they did also earlier this year when we saw them at Turku Saatanalle, they really got their fans going thanks to their tight stage presence and their charismatic vocalist (known also from CORAXUL, and live with IKU-TURSO, ORDER OF NOSFERAT among others), which makes them a good act to see live. They have been, of course, more active in that sense in recent years, which helped solidify their performance.

It has almost become a tradition over the last few years that Steelfest would bring some old-school South American bands into their lineup, and it has worked really well so far as they always bring that Latin take and intense energy into the mix. It should not come then as a surprise that the Colombian MASACRE’s was one of the most positive shows today with their old-school death metal. They also did have a bunch of hardcore fans from their homeland who made sure to make some extra noise up front, but in general, it was a really entertaining display of Colombian aggression, focused largely on the classics of the Medellín-based combo. This kind of stuff always gets us in a good mood!

Back inside, we met again with Severoth, this time with his other, more traditional black metal project МОРОК. The band hasn’t been very active, with its two full-length releases being dated 10 and 9 years ago respectively, as clearly the artist’s focus has been on other projects, and as we know, then a lot has been happening that forced him to relocate to Poland. Nonetheless, it showed a different, more raw side of his creativity, and it worked quite well live, representing another pleasant surprise at this festival.

Next up were the Germans of BAXAXAXA. The Bavarian band has a bit of a weird story, dating back more than 30 years and yet being “frozen” for 25 years after their first demo, as it sometimes happens, except it found new life when the drummer brought it back from the dead with some of his fellow bandmates from UNGOD. Reminiscent of early SAMAEL among others, their traditional anti-Christianity black metal – a thing which was well on display – worked very well and was one of the gigs we were expecting the most today, fully meeting our expectations at that. Raw and menacing, it is one of those bands that we got to listen to still for quite a bit in these days following the festival.

Yesterday we saw Proscriptor + ZEMIAL, today was ZEMIAL’s (+ Proscriptor‘s guest appearance) turn to play their own set on the very same stage. Probably because of last night, there might have been some higher expectations on their show, which felt a bit underwhelming in that sense. Eventually, Mr. McGovern showed up in a leather jacket to sing with them, which was quite predictable, and yet raised the level of entertainment of this gig.

Another band that didn’t feel like it worked at its full potential was IMPRECATION. Make no mistake, the show was good, but perhaps again the expectations were much higher (plus they have had now for 4 years CRUCIAMENTUM‘s drummer with them), or maybe we were just not in the right mood for it, but it felt like it could have been even better. Still, it’s highly appreciated to have these kinds of old-school death metal veterans here in what was an exclusive show for Northern Europe.

Many people were rather disappointed by the fact that MORTIIS had to cancel his performance at the festival. Not quite sure about the issue, but likely some airport mishap with his gear, as he was happily hanging around and enjoying the evening himself, so at least he was physically present. I bet not many expected that RITUALHAMMER would have delivered a pretty good blackened death set in his stead, especially given the short notice. Having seen the band in their base of Tampere about a month earlier, we were not surprised, and even happy for the band to have the chance to show what they’ve got to a broader audience. Hopefully, that made them gain some new fans; we enjoyed it for sure!

It’s not often that you get to hear Italian when the band is going on stage, but AD HOMINEM made that possible. It was also one of the more overtly controversial bands this year, not doing anything to hide it, unlike the live members of the band, who all wore balaclavas. There was no drummer for some reason, so they played with a drum machine. The spotlight was anyway all for the French mainman Kaiser Wodhanaz, who had no problem in getting in the audience’s favor, even when he walked on stage a very little-dressed overweight woman on all fours with a muzzle on her face, leading her on a leash and occasionally stepping on her back (the woman was apparently Finnish, so we were wondering how did they phrase this to the organizers when the band requested this). Not yet sure to this day what that added to the show, but at least it caused countless people to get filming with their phones.

Again inside, it was time for some Norwegian black metal in the form of Trondheim-based WHOREDOM RIFE. This band has grown quite a following with its two most recent releases and they certainly are able to get their fans engaged in their live shows, as was clear tonight as well. After all, the members have their hands deep in their black metal circle and we can see how their music can have an appeal on a large part of the audience at this event. In fact, there were plenty of excited fans inside the hall.

As we were nearing the end of the festival, it was time for OSCULUM INFAME to make another appearance here at Steelfest after a very successful stint in 2022. This was a special occasion for the band as the French performed with the addition of the original vocalist Vlad Drakul. Call it a matter of taste, but we find that it is quite hard to make things work when you have multiple “main” vocalists on stage, and while it was certainly interesting, it somehow overshadowed the mystery and the intrigue from their earlier performance at this festival. Nothing to criticize, however, about the execution itself, but it felt like watching a different band in a way.

Indoors, DEMONCY was malignant from the get-go. The trio – which includes SARGEIST‘s guitarist VJS – made the most of their allotted time with a show that exuded evil and sounded very much on point with a tight set. Also, Ixithra‘s hairstyle brought the mind back to the 80s, when the band was at its infancy. Their no-nonsense approach worked really well and was also a good prelude to the more flamboyant satanic style of their fellow Americans, ACHERON. The band led by Vincent Crowley is also a bit of a different beast, as they are clearly more oriented towards traditional US death metal, but still they have, and had tonight, a more showy approach to their live performance, which the audience seemed to dig quite a bit. As the band was not able to make it to Turku a few years back, it was great to finally see them on this big stage unleashing their satanic message (the frontman used to be part of the Church of Satan, after all). They played for the occasion a special set focused on “Rites of the Black Mass” (1992) and “Anti-God, Anti-Christ” (1996) for the excitement of their fans, in what was a more than dignified wrap for the shows on the outdoor stage.

The final band of this year’s edition, and one that somewhat divided the expectations of the audience between “being the next closest thing to SARCÓFAGO that you can get these days” and “a disappointing cover band” (these are actual comments from people we talked to before and during the event), was GERALD “INCUBUS” MINELLI & THE LAWS KILL DESTROY playing the songs of the legendary Brazilian band, which is particularly revered here in Finland and perhaps one of the reasons why the opinions were so divided. The result was perhaps a bit mixed, as it sounded better than what many expected, but still more of a cover band project in a sense, without a massive presence like Wagner Antichrist (who these days plays very different music). Nonetheless, it was still an entertaining show, which included a couple of guest vocalists as well – Apparition from POLTERGEIST, and this one guy who spent most of the weekend filming with his phone and taking selfies – even while holding vinyls – in the photo pit and from the side and back of the stage with pretty much all bands, with no respect for any etiquette towards people who were actually there to take photos. While this gig was a fun way to end the evening – and the festival – the fatigue from the three days started manifesting quite badly and as a result, we ended up sitting down in the back for a bit, before heading to pack our gear and back to the flat for the usual extra late dinner and drinks.

This concluded yet another rich and successful Steelfest, which these days is THE event where to be if you are into proper, uncompromising extreme music. It’s hard to find another event that can count on such a trustworthy crew who has been handling this for well over a decade with increasing expertise and professionalism, worthy of praise year after year. It might not have been the flashiest of the line-ups, but we don’t mind having less “huge” names when the overall quality is still kept this high – not to mention all the special performances and shows that can be seen only here, or almost exclusively at least. Of course, the festival has also been a platform for the debut of new bands (like NIGHT SHALL DRAPE US, or VULTYRIUM), but most of all, we are very glad that MISÞYRMING got to play here again, as this was the most fantastic gig we witnessed of them to date

We already got to know a few gems coming up for the next edition, but even without that we would be certain it’s going to be a good one, because it always is. So once again, we are looking forward to this same weekend in mid-May next year, as many other people do!