Friday night was a big night on the Neumann 2009 Concert calendar - Slayer and Megadeth at Festival Hall. Having seen Megadeth 4 times beforehand, and loved them each time, I was keen to see them again on the back of one of their strongest recent releases ("Endgame"). And having not seen Slayer at all before, I was really keen to see them. Unfortunately, the night was a mixture of ups and downs.

First up, met up with Chris, Sean and Pauly for some dinner down at the pub - was nice to see them again and just talk some shit. The support band was "Double Dragon" - a local band, who weren't bad - nothing spectacular, but a good opening act. Megadeth hit the stage at about 8:30 or so (an early beginning!). They came out and opened with "Set the world afire" - a great opening track, however the sound was pretty terrible. Too much treble - sounded like the crowd was just screaming the entire time (which they weren't), and a distinct lack of bass. The band went straight into "Wake Up Dead" and then "Devil's Island". Three excellent tracks, all a bit underwhelming because of the distracting sound quality. After "Devil's Island", Dave Mustaine spoke into the mic; "We'll be back when we get this sound sorted out" and left the stage. 2 or 3 minutes later they were back on stage with Mustaine; "You deserve better than that". They then went into "She-Wolf" - the sound was exponentially better. I have no idea what happened, but from then on the sound was awesome. Overall, the setlist looked kinda like this;

• Set The World Afire
• Wake Up Dead
• Devil's Island
• She Wolf
• Hangar 18
• Rattlehead (!)
• In My Darkest Hour
• Headcrusher
• Tornado of Souls
• Symphony of Destruction
• Peace Sells
• Holy Wars

A great setlist. I would've liked to hear more off the new album (the first time I've said that about a band for a long time - but it's such a great album, and even "Headcrusher" that they did play, sounded fantastic live). I guess the biggest highlight for me from Megadeth's set was Chris Broderick, the new guitarist. He's a fucking machine. He perfected the solo from Tornado of Souls - one of the most distinctive and challenging solo's in metal - and one that I've seen delivered NQR by a few Megadeth lead guitarists in recent years. Megadeth ripped up the stage in general - did a fantastic show and set a real standard for Slayer to live up to.

Slayer, unfortunately, did not live up to that standard, due to one small yet crucial element; Tom Araya's vocals. I was really excited to be seeing Slayer, had been listening to them a fair bit in the lead-up, etc. When they opened proceedings in a blistering fury with War Ensemble, I was blown away. They had 36 Marshall cabs on stage and the loudness to back it up. And King and Hanneman were not only delivering in their playing, but their guitar sound was just jaw-dropping. The first 30 seconds had all the makings of an unforgettable night. Then Tom Araya started to sing... and it became an unforgettable night for all the wrong reasons. Apparently he had blown his voice out - after the first song he made an announcement to the crowd saying as much, and the majority of Slayer's remaining set was performed as instrumentals. Now, as a guitarist, I very much appreciate Slayer for the music, not the vocals, of which I've always thought Araya's vocals were pretty ordinary. But to NOT have them just sounded lame... and I quickly realised that a lot of the energy, fury and drive from the songs come from the lyrics and vocals.

One of the most frustrating parts of the night was that after each song, the stage would go completely dark and the band would pause for 1 to 2 minutes - I assume to work out if they should go on or not. It was a complete mood killer - breaking the momentum constantly. They did get a couple of guest vocalists up (Paul Haug from Contrive did an EXCELLENT job of Dead Skin Mask). I just wish they had've made a call one way or the other; cancel the show, play with a guest vocalist the whole show, or play the instrumental versions one after the other, no gaps in between. It's not the same singing "South of Heaven" or "Raining Blood" to yourself though. It was a very disappointing night... especially given how good the band did sound - had there been some vocals, wow. But there weren't any vocals, and as a result it was a major let-down.

Labels: Concerts