Nile, Hideous Divinity, Pestifer, and Intrepid – Manchester Rebellion 10th September 2024
Intrepid:
Well, HOLY SHIT what an opener! Hailing from Estonia, Intrepid are a death metal band with roots heavily planted in the early 90s old school way of doing things. Usually, one of my complaints is that most modern death metal has ran out of ideas and appears to be a tedious pastiche of Immolation and Suffocation clone-a-likes; there’s only so many things you can say about a band before it starts to get on your wick.
Not so, with these guys. Maybe it’s me being an old bugger nowadays – but the band captured the essence of what got me into extreme metal – with highly technical riffing and PHAT BASS SHAPES that reminded me of very early Cynic, Death, and Morbid Angel. 4.7 / 5 Goth Marks
Pestifer:
Making the trip from Belgium, Pestifer are another very healthy death metal choice that was clearly expertly picked by Karl Sanders and the lads as tour mates. Crunchy furious riffs abound, that have a sci fi lyrical focus akin to Nocturnus minus the keyboards.
Also, rather brilliantly – another very strong modern (ish – they’ve been going since 2004) death metal band that hold their own very well that stand head and shoulders above the newer stuff out there with a strong and confident air. 4.4 / 5 Goth Marks
Hideous Divinity:
The band rolls up on stage, with Enrico – the grand orator and orchestrator of mayhem that harbours strong Bond villain vibes, and if a future film was made featuring this dude, there’s little doubt that he would also get the band to feature in a scene (that would actually pretty fucking mega, to be honest).
Anyway, flights of fantasy aside – these Italian lads bash out crunchy slabs of technical/brutal death metal that errs towards the side of modern day production values akin to Origin with slight tinge of ‘slam’ into the mix which cultivated a pretty reasonable mosh pit. In particular ‘Chestburst’ is a massive banger that will certainly have myself and many other investigating them further. 4.2 / 5 Goth Marks
Nile:
Despite forming in 1993 (the year I got into metal, funnily enough) and making a couple of demos, one EP, and the their debut album ‘Amongst the Catacombs of Nephren-Ka’, it wasn’t until 2000 that they blew everyone’s head clean off with the legendary ‘Black Seeds of Vengeance’ album; a breath of fresh air that committed a formidable feat in getting into Kerrang magazine (a publication that’s more interested in pursuing ‘false metal’ such as LimpSlipKorn, at the time).
Despite numerous lineup changes that would’ve crippled lesser bands (with Karl Sanders being the only founding member), they’re a highly consistent band that shows no signs of giving up. The lineup of George Kolias, Brian Kingsland, Dam Vadim Don, Zach Jeter and Karl are absolutely solid musicians that all have an impressive CV that do all their songs new and old extremely well. The triple vocal assault and shredding riffs are still as amazing as when I seen them in 2004 in Sheffield (not forgetting Karl is one of the nicest and friendliest blokes in metal on a par with the late Chuck Schuldiner). New tracks like ‘Chapter For Not Being Hung Upside Down…’ fitted well with the likes of massive bangers like ‘Lashed To The Slave Stick’, and ‘Sarcophagus’ very well and setting the crowd into a frenzy of mosh pit action. 4.8/5 Goth Marks
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