14 December 2014

Morbid Angel – The Garage, Glasgow – 09/12/2014

Jurga Kalinauskaite 14 December 2014 Event Reviews

Reviewed by: Jurga Kalinauskaite

Rating:: 5

On 14 December 2014

Last modified:14 December 2014

Summary:

The busiest time of the year has come. Yeah, when amazingly great bands have even more awesome gigs one after another and if you have to choose one it might become real torture. So many of us end up going to lots of them. Morbid Angel gig was one of those that you just cannot miss, first of all, because they are one of those painfully great live metal bands and the second – it is the Covenant 20th Anniversary Tour! No need to mention what that means for the many metalheads, following the death metal scene. It’s been already 20 years…

On a rainy and gloomy December evening in Glasgow, the bands started just 20 minutes after The Garage doors were opened. On stage first were really good mood Edinburgh death metal stars Cancerous Womb. If one has been in Glasgow at least for a while, it is impossible not know of these guys in one way or another. Kicking Scottish death metal/grindcore scene since 2008, these guys had some news to say that night. After 6 years of grind’n’roll, vocalist Chris Lewis said it very shortly: “I’m being a dick and leaving them”. This gig was one of the last with him. Thirty minutes of a groovy and energetic show while the club was filling up with metalheads was a great warmup for Morbid Angel. In order to make it a little more fancy, Scordaturas vocalist Daryl Boyce came up on the stage for the last song “From Gunt To Cunt” to do guest vocals. With this brutal note the show was over.

The next ones to terrorize the stage were self proclaimed blood metallers – Achren. Precise and neat show from Glaswegian salted with some extra lights. After ten years of playing, these guys on stage are proper veterans of Glaswegian metal scene and give respectfully great energy as well. Sounding way more serious and darker than the fellows from Edinburgh they prepared everyone for the stars of the night – Morbid Angel.

Achren setlist:
Fuck It Hard
On the Wings of War
Archangel
The Eschatologist
Suomen Susi (The Finnish Wolf)
Pestilence
Forgotten King

After half an hour break and while the stage was readied, Morbid Angel were finally on. No pomposity with solemn intros, just four death metal fellows from the US, starting their show with the fun note on vocalist David Vincent side. Admittedly, the headliners were nothing but amazing with their Covenant based setlist with the mix of new and older songs for the end. Neck cracking good old death metal and crushing quality of the sound and the whole show – that’s what you get with a Morbid Angel headlining show – it is almost impossible to leave unsatisfied. Although guys looked a little bit tired as they already played several gigs in a row, that didn’t make the show any worse. Morbid Angel have been on their Covenant 20th Anniversary Tour in Europe since the beginning of the November, and played over 20 gigs before the night in Glasgow. The least tired of them all seemed to be energy ball – Tim Yeung, he was someone you could call pure storm behind the drums, demonstrating amazing technical skills and showing off. Not so many drummers can beat him playing live sets.

By the time Morbid Angel started playing their set, quite a lot of metalheads had gathered in the club, although it was not totally packed. Despite that, the audience was surprisingly passive – almost no circle pits or crowd surfers during any of the bands, just rhythmically nodding heads and a few attempts to mosh during the “Angel of Disease” and “Immortal Rites”. Hearing applause after each track it was possible to assume, that metalheads in front of Morbid Angel were simply hypnotized by the mind blowing sound and view on the stage.

Morbid Angel setlist:
Rapture
Pain Divine
World of Shit (The Promised Land)
Vengeance Is Mine
The Lion’s Den
Blood on My Hands
Angel of Disease
Sworn to the Black
Nar Mattaru
God of Emptiness
Where the Slime Live
Bil Ur-Sag
Ageless, Still I Am
Curse the Flesh
Existo Vulgoré
Immortal Rites
Fall from Grace