Lacuna Coil @ The Corporation, 28th September 2010

They said it would never happen. They said we were dreamers. But on September 28th, 2010, Lacuna Coil returned to the Corporation, their first visit since the heady days of 2006 when I first ever saw them live. Of course, we've seen them since. Back in January we hauled ourselves over to Manchester for the Shallow Life launch tour, but here they were playing our favourite local metal venue, next door to one of our favourite pubs. How could we possibly miss it?

Mark from Troika

Two support acts were playing that cold Tuesday night; Troika, a local band, and Slaves To Gravity, who were supporting the whole tour. I really enjoyed Troika's set. The band have a quirky amateur demeanour but the music is amazing. Really talented local bunch of Sheffield lads. I'll be checking their music out again in the future for sure. Possibly find a gig to go buy CDs direct from the band.

Slaves To Gravity were up next. They're not really my cup of tea, I'll be honest. Little bit too much grunge and posturing for my taste, but the crowd loved it. I love finding that a band I would never normally listen to put on a show that gets the crowd going. The atmosphere is what makes live music special.

Slaves To Gravity

After a wait that felt like an eternity, as it always does while waiting for Lacuna Coil to come on stage, the house lights dimmed. A hush descended, just for a moment, and the crowd went wild.

And what a show they put on! Starting out with Underdog and I'm Not Afraid from Shallow Life, this proved to be a very varied show with some delving into the band's back catalogue. Classics like Honeymoon Suite and Half Life made an appearance, as well as long standing favourites Swamped and Heaven's A Lie.

Karmacode stole most of the show, with eight of the eighteen tracks played from that album. Fragments Of Faith and Our Truth are a must, and of course, what would a Lacuna Coil show be without a sing-along to Enjoy The Silence? Shallow Life came in second, with six tracks including I Won't Tell You and Spellbound. The setlist was expertly put together, effectively mixing classics and recent fan favourites to keep the pace throughout the entire set and into the encore.

The Corporation once again shone as a live venue. While Manchester Academy 1 was an impressive venue, it lacked the intimacy of the Corporation. At the larger venue, you watch a show. At the Corp, you are part of it. I was very excited when I found out about the gig, and now I can safely say it's the best Lacuna Coil gig I've ever seen. Simply awesome.

Crystalic - Persistence

The music industry is a funny old beast. While your Justin Biebers and Lady Gagas are getting multi-million dollar/pound/groat deals (depending on locality), there are talented metal bands literally giving their albums away because they can't get a label to back them. Crystalic are one such band. After three years of trying, and failing, to get a decent deal from record execs, they'd done the only thing left; released Persistence, their aptly titled new album, for free via their website.

The band's lyrics deal with such topics as philosophy, society and the human condition. Pretty standard death metal fare, and fitting to the hard, heavy chug and the fast-paced, intricate riffs. The staccato blasts of the drum behind the driving rhythm of the guitars has an urgency that is infectious. Even the guitar noodling during the solos carries the mood. It makes your heart skip and your stomach tie itself in knots as you feel the energy of the music.

The album seems split in half, the first being a series of hard hitting death metal tracks to showcase the band's musical talent, and the second being a more commercial selection. Between the two halves is the album's only instrumental track, Eulogy. It's dedicated to the memory of Chuck Schuldiner, the father of death metal and founder of Death.

Every track on this album is great, but the stand-out tracks for me are Wall Of Sanity, Voiceless Army and Blastbeat Of My Heart. Blastbeat is an ear-worm of a track, and gets itself inside your head and stays there. That track alone has prompted me to play the entire album numerous times after subconsciously singing it to myself while walking around Tesco.

For fans of melodic or progressive death metal, this album is about as pure as it gets. And those who are not might as well have a listen. It's free, after all. Put your headphones on, crank up the volume, and get ready to detonate the blastbeat of your heart.

ʇɐǝqVol

My Volbeat CD arrived this morning! Been having a read through the lyrics and noticed quite a few recurring elements. Who is Mr Cadillac, for instance? Lots of angels turning into devils and the like too. And 16 Dollars, the track that sounds like Walk This Way, actually references Aerosmith and Walk This Way in the first verse. I'd completely missed that when listening to it. That proves that it's homage, rather than coincidence or plagiarism.

But the most mind-bending bit of the whole presentation is in the little book of lyrics itself. All the left hand pages are printed upside down. At first I thought there was something wrong with it, but no, it's supposed to be like that. It makes it very difficult to figure out whether to turn the page left or right when trying to read it, which I guess is the point. Interesting stuff.