The Indian organizers have induced an addiction of concerts amongst the fans over the past couple of years. Having seen our favourite international artists last year from Opeth in February through Lamb Of God, Kreator, Megadeth, Children Of Bodom and Slayer to Testament, Gojira and Periphery in December, every metalhead across the country started looking forward to more and more gigs. Sadly, half of the year has gone by and there weren’t any international concerts this time, except for Anthrax and Mastodon’s performances at the Fly Music Festival, which got canned unfortunately.
The second edition of Bangalore Open Air, the first major metal concert of the year, was scheduled to take place on July 6, 2013 and this time had something huge to offer. With six international and two Indian artists, Bangalore Open Air substantiated its association with Wacken Open Air; where last year’s line-up only had Kreator and Suidakra, this time the Jaymahal Palace Grounds were to be rocked by bands like Iced Earth, Sodom, Dark Tranquillity, Ihsahn, Leprous and Animals As Leaders. However, blemished with pull-outs and low ticked sales, the success of the gig was in question.
I was pretty stoked about this event from a past few weeks and was in full preparation to have a wonderful evening, when the news of Sodom, my favourite amongst the line-up, pulling out from the show. The rumours of lack of funds, which the organizers were facing, had already surfaced and given that Millennium backed out a couple of weeks from the show, it pretty much scared me. A lot of people from the “old school crowd” were coming to the gig for Sodom and didn’t turn up because of such last minute disappointment. Whatsoever, five bands were still good enough a reason for me to go the show; so I did.
The weather in Bangalore is generally quite pleasant but on that particular day, it was even better. After the Wacken Metal Battle had terminated on the Jeff Hanneman Stage, Demonic Resurrection, one of the oldest bands in the Indian metal scene, took the Ronnie James Dio stage to deliver the first performance of the evening. Their set was quite small, yet it warmed up the crowd perfectly with its energy. The Blackened Death Metal band from Mumbai was performing in Bangalore after a long time and audience seemed to be delighted which was quite interpreted after looking at the bellicose headbanging near the barricades. Sahil Makhija’s vocals were at their best and the sound was rather solid and impressive, especially in the band’s last song ‘The Unrelenting Surge Of Vengeance’.
Sahil had almost stopped addressing the crowd, when the sound of clean guitars of ‘Waves Of Babies’ appeared on the PA and the audience ran through the ground to the Hanneman stage in a fast stream. Animals As Leaders are known for the high amount of technicality and Tosin Abasi’s mind-blowing solos which their songs contain, but above all they are known for the usage of 8-string guitars, which actually looked pretty massive and beastly as they ripped apart audience’s gaze with brilliant sweeps. What was literally ripped apart in their set was Matt Garstka’s bass drum, which he later autographed and threw it in the pool of fans, to be received by the lucky one. Tosin mentioned that he always wanted to come to India and never knew that India had such a big metal fanbase. The crowd’s response, like in every show was vibrant and booming, successfully putting across a message to the band.
After having thoroughly enjoyed Animals As Leaders, people had to rush out to the Dio stage, which was ready for its next performance featuring Leprous, followed by Ihsahn. There wasn’t any gap between the two performances, which I would say was a bad move as it killed the excitement of seeing a band take the stage and the previous band leaving the stage. The feeling of watching a demigod perform in front of doesn’t subside when another enters the stage. Ironically, having chatted up with a lot of people at the entry gate, many of them were pretty stoked about watching Leprous above all bands but the response from the audience was pretty cold in comparison to what they gave in Animals As Leaders. But the band’s set was quite dynamic and surreal; perhaps their music is one of the most innovative forms of Progressive Metal.
At the end of Leprous’ set, Ihsahn entered the stage and suddenly the level of excitement had increased to welcome the “emperor” of black metal on the stage. Being already a fan of his studio work, I personally enjoyed Ihsahn more than any other artist on the day. His music, so filled with warm, pleasant and eclectic guitar melodies, created a deep and extravagant atmosphere in the field and the songs had a totally different feel live altogether. My high point of his set was when the members switched their guitars from 8-string to 6-string, as I knew that they were gonna unveil ‘Unhealer’, which also turned out to be the crowd’s favourite. Right from the melancholic guitar harmony in the intro to the fantastic solo, the song sounded pretty strong.
The next band on the list was the Gothenburg Melodic Death Metal legends, Dark Tranquillity, who occupied the Hanneman Stage soon after Ihsahn’s performance concluded. Dark Tranquillity was perhaps the most awaited performer of the evening; Sodom, being pulled out from the line-up. Their rich and melancholic sound mixed up with death metal riffs, created an interest in both the new school and old school listeners. Their set mostly consisted of songs from their new album, ‘Construct’ like ‘The Science Of Noise’, ‘Uniformity’ etc. but it also offered a great deal of the band’s classics. There were a lot of technical hiccups during Dark Tranquillity’s set; the guitars were constantly disappearing from the PA which was pretty bad thing as it really spoilt the flow of the songs and above all pissed off the band members. But Dark Tranquillity pulled a brilliant set at the end of the day.
As soon as DT’s set concluded, the headliners for the evening, Iced Earth, took the stage. Dressed in a biker’s uniform, with ripped denim jeans and a heavy metal denim jacket, the band perfectly carried the flag of heavy metal. The band’s set was graced by Stu’s extraordinary vocal range and Troy’s spectacular guitar solos. There was a lot of energy amongst the band members on the stage as they moved from one point to the other, interacting with the audience by hand gestures and giving away their plectrums. They ended the set with the classic self-titled track Iced Earth which was again loved and cheered by the audience.
The turn-out at the event was a bit disappointing. Apparently the festival was attended by 2500 people officially, which is quite understood as the most anticipated act, Sodom, was cancelled due to certain “unforeseen circumstances”.
However, at the end of the day, five bands were more than enough to satisfy me and make me feel worthy of the money I spent. Bangalore Open Air was indeed a very good effort to put India on the global metal map and certainly delivered a great evening to most people who visited the concert.
