Tag Archives: live review

Over the past couple of years, Voodoo – a converted restaurant just off Belfast’s main shopping thoroughfare – has become one of my favourite venues in my home city.  Having rapidly established itself as the hangout of choice for a large proportion of the local rock and metal fraternity, it’s …

Although they don’t play their native Ireland on a regular basis, Gama Bomb were tonight returning to Belfast for the second time in around eight months, this time finding themselves in the rather sedate surroundings of the Empire Music Hall:  as its name suggests, this converted church is used to …

There’s a saying about a week being a long time in politics, but in the music business a year can be very short – and that can certainly be said of Belfast upstarts Maverick, for whom this return to the legendary Limelight for their second headline slot in as many …

Belfast has become something of a favourite stopping off point for US bands either going to or from the European festival circuit…  In recent years the path to this little corner of planet metal has been trodden by acts as diverse as Tesla and Metallica, Machine Head and Black Stone …

When is a tribute band not a tribute band?  One answer would be when the band is question is not only in itself a tribute to the great music which it performs but also contains within its ranks the majority of the supremely talented musicians which created that music – …

With Belfast once more teetering on the brink of descending into the chaos that is laughlingly referred to in the mainstream media as the ‘Marching Season’, and less than a week to go to its annual highlight of ‘The Twelfth’, Welsh hardcore mob Brutality Will Prevail could hardly have chosen …

I had first heard about Vintage Trouble through mutual friends and contacts in other band fan groups I had become involved in. After looking at their material and videos on YouTube and seeing how they perform live I was hooked and really looking forward to the day I could see …

When Slayer first announced this, the last of three intimate warm up shows on the island of Ireland in preparation for their trip around the European festival circuit – culminating, of course, at Bloodstock – there was at first a certain degree of incredulity.  “Are you fucking serious?” was the …

Launch gigs can be weird affairs… all too often, the band doing the launch, be it an EP or whatever, deliberately pull together a rather lame supporting cast, so as not to expose their own weaknesses.  The alternative, and much more preferable option, is to invite along support acts which …

It may be seven years since Lordi firmly put their particular brand of comic book metal well and truly on the international map with their sensational, tongue-in-cheek win at the 2007 Eurovision Song Contest, but the fascination with the band nevertheless endures, with the memory of that night in Athens …

A few weeks back, one of PM’s young buck recruits took it upon his fanboy self to pop along to the end of a pier somewhere on the English coast and review his favourite band, metalcore/dubstep crossover wunderkinds Enter Shikari (http://planetmosh.com/enter-shikari-grand-pier-weston-super-mare-10th-april-2013/).  Nowt wrong with that, you might say – and …

It’s the last Saturday in March, and just hours before the clocks are turned forward the start of what is supposed to be British Summer Time – what a feckin’ joke!  Outside, the temperature is barely pushing above zero degrees, and inside… well, I swear it’s even colder, with the …

While those with a lot less sense were out ‘drowning the shamrock’ and “celebrating” what laughingly passes for the ‘national saint’s day’ in this corner of the world, by getting as hammered as possible as quickly possible and then hammering the living daylights out of each other in an unprecedented …

Tonight’s bill is a typically eclectic one – ranging from classic thrash through dark sludge to ambient black metal – ensuring a healthy crowd drawn from a wide spectrum of Belfast’s metal community, with the added advantage of it being the beginning of (for many) a long holiday weekend helping …

Tucked away on a cobbled side street on the edge of the oldest part of Belfast, Oh Yeah is a former whiskey bonding warehouse converted into a bespoke music centre – its ground floor a museum by day and a venue by night, its upper floors filled with recording studios, …

Life is full of disappointments, and it must be said that this evening was one of the more disappointing in my life as a rock critic. Derry four piece Mourning Of The Heretic made a decent fist of their opening slot, with their brand of gothic death metal mixed with …

I must admit to having been somewhat sceptical about the location for the Belfast leg of Grand Magus’ first UK headlining tour – a nightclub in the city centre more used to hosting spide-crammed ‘dance’ events (or ‘raves’ in old money) than brutally loud heavy metal gigs… OK, I know …

Given the size of Northern Ireland’s Polish population – and the assumption that a healthy proportion of them should be heavy metal fans – it is somewhat surprising that, outside of tonight’s headliners and their entourage, every accent in the room is a local one (in some shape or form) …

It had been five months since Norn Iron’s premier rawk ‘n’f’n’ roll crue had played the region’s capital, and their return to not only the city but also the comparatively cramped Pavilion venue shows that the quintet are just as comfortable playing in sweaty bar rooms as they are in …

It’s a Saturday afternoon in Belfast, and that means there is only one place any self-respecting metalhead should be… down the ‘Slimer’, necking pints, enjoying the craic and breaking necks at the weekly RocKD!  This weekend’s show is an extra bit special, as it also marks the official launch of …