Lamb of God

This weekend was another instance of "for the last time" as a long-planned weekend away with my two best friends occurred. We decided to go back to our roots and find a really heavy gig to go to as a celebration of my leaving.

Lamb of God

I found the Lamb of God tour and when we realised that the London gig was at Brixton (I don't THINK I'd been there since I saw Skunk Anansie there in 1997 or so) and on a Saturday tickets were bought without hesitation.

So after a night of awful films (including this gem which I actually loved, and would recommend to all of you.. honestly) we had a morning of more dreadful films (are you seeing a pattern yet?) we sloped into London on the train and found ourselves a pub in Victoria, just up the line from Brixton.

In the pub with my mates

Pub lunch, and a couple of pints each, and the bill was not extreme which rather shocked me too. We got to the venue about half an hour before the doors were due to open and, true to form, the metal fans had all turned up really early so the queue was round two whole sides of the building.

Waiting for the first band

It didn't take that long to get in, once it started moving, and after hitting the merch (and buying a t shirt with a skull with a beard on it; how awesome!) and the bar (where three small bottles of Carling cost as much as my t shirt, which was overpriced) we headed for our seats and managed to grab extra legroom seats on the front of a bay with a great view of the stage.

The first band on were a band called Huntress. They were SO metal; taking it back to what it all used to be about with screaming guitar and brilliant songs (with weird lyrics, as we found out when reading them on the CD my mate bought). I had a silly grin on my face throughout the entire set. One of the things I'd forgotten about metal gigs was just how into it the crowd gets. After years of going to non-metal gigs and seeing just how sparse the crowd is for anything other than the headline act, to witness just how rammed the place was for this band (who were on about half an hour after doors opened) and how the crowd reacted reminded me of why metal gigs are so good.

After Huntress there was a short break and then a death metal band from Poland called Decapitated took the stage. This was unremitting and LOUD and I didn't enjoy it quite as much as Huntress but it was impressive and the singer(?) had the most amazing long dreadlocks which he flung around to the best effect. The one strange thing was they kept going off stage and coming back on between songs and the lack of interaction with the crowd kept me from feeling that involved.

The road crew prepare for Lamb of God

Once Decapitated finished the crew jumped on the stage and did their really efficient job of derigging the drum kit and clearing everything away, then getting the stage set for Lamb of God.

Stage set, waiting for the band

There was quite a long wait with the stage prepared and nothing happening and the crowd got a little restless, chanting "Lamb of God" and cheering when any member of the band was spotted back stage or moving around behind the drum riser.

Then the main lights dropped and the build up music started rumbling and building the suspense and finally the band burst onto stage in a crash and bang and explosion of noise and energy. It was like men after boys; these guys have been around for a very long time and it shows why they are huge and managed to sell out Brixton completely.

Lamb of God ripping it up

Everything about the show was big and loud; the lights were impressive, the strobe effects were overwhelming at times, and the volume was such that the liquid in our beer bottles was vibrating and throbbing.

An awesome picture by my mate John

We were (as previously described) in seats in the circle however as soon as the band appeared we were on our feet and we only sat down for a few moments after that point, jumping around in place and generally getting into the spirit of things. The whole of the circle was doing the same thing and the reaction of the crowd seemed to be getting to the band as they commented a couple of times just how amazed they were.

In the spotlight

After what seemed like moments, but was actually about an hour and a half, the band finally finished their set and left to major applause and we headed fast towards the underground to start the journey home. We beat the crowds (by moving faster than anyone else) and were able to get home in time to get cheesy chips from a place near my mate's house.

Ripping a new one

All in all, this was a cracking weekend and a fit and proper way to celebrate our friendship and the times we have had together.