Friday, July 19th, the Metal tour of the summer featuring Lamb Of God and Mastodon kicked off at the Texas Trust CU Theatre in Grand Prairie, Tx. For these monumental metal acts, this year marks the 20th anniversary of their releases of Ashes Of The Wake and Leviathan respectively (August 31st) and the two have joined forces, bringing Kerry King and Malevolence with them. The theatre, settled between Dallas and Ft Worth would prove to be ground zero for the festivities to come nation-wide, and Metalheads of every variety showed up to kick thing off with a bang.
Kicking off the show was Malevolence, an absolutely inspired sound in Hardcore from across the pond. This band have been making headwinds on Metal radio for the past several years and finally are getting the chance to leave their mark on the States. Ripping through Slamming hits such as Life Sentence and Keep Your Distance instill in Metalheads worldwide why this is unquestionably the rising star of the Metal World. One of the pivotal moments of their set came with the song Higher Place when the band delivered a more slow-paced sing-along that instantly strikes a chord with the likes of Pantera.
Members
Alex Taylor – lead vocals
Josh Baines – guitar
Konan Hall – guitar, co-lead vocals
Wilkie Robinson – bass
Charlie Thorpe – drums
Setlist
Malicious Intent
Life Sentence
Still Waters Run Deep
Self Supremacy
Higher Place
Keep Your Distance
On Broken Glass
MALEVOLENCE
Kerry King took the stage next and made his return to Metalheads in North Texas with a star-studded solo project. Without exaggeration, the legendary guitarist was joined by Phil Demmel on Guitar, Kyle Sanders on Bass, former Slayer drummer Paul Bostaph, and the siren Warcry of Death Angel’s Mark Osegueda. The alchemy of these many incredible pedigrees…… Sounds gloriously like more Slayer. Which is not a bad thing! In fact with the spoil of riches assembled onstage I was actually shocked this wasn’t a headliner. King came to this theater with the fresh, new recordings of his declaration, From Hell I Rise, reminding everyone of his mythical status! Whipping a crowd into a furious frenzy with the opening track Where I Reign, by the time he laid into a blistering fast guitar solo the tone of the night was set. Shredding his way through the new album the crowd was given one more reason to go wild when the pounding riffs of Slayer’s Black Magic rang through the hall. Immediately after that as the stage went dark, the sound of rain could be heard, punctuated by the thunderous drum pounding of Raining Blood. Hearing this song played live in Dallas for the first time in 5 years was the proper shot of adrenaline Dallas needed to be set for the acts to follow.
Members
Kerry King – Guitar
Phil Demmel – Guitar
Mark Osegueda – Lead Vocals
Kyle Sanders – Bass
Paul Bostaph – Drummer
Setlist
Where I Reign
Trophies of the Tyrant
Residue
Toxic
Idle Hands
Shrapnel
Raining Blood
(Slayer song)
Black Magic
(Slayer song)
From Hell I Rise
KERRY KING
Next it was Mastodon’s turn, ready to dive back into 20 years of their breakout record, Leviathan (No punn intended, but I’ll take it). A curtain drop was all it took to kick off the blistering opening of Blood And Thunder, a powerful slamming battlecry of what put this album into a league of it’s own. On the 20th anniversary of Leviathan, what perspective can we draw from this point in the band’s development? This album was not only the breakout hit for Mastodon as song-writers, but a turning point for the subgenres of Metalcore and Prog-Metal in general. Leviathan, as was made painfully clear in hearing every song played out live, is a cohesive vision. Every track feels like an indispensable chapter in a complete story. In the benefit of hindsight, by this point Mastodon was blending the punk/hardcore sensibilities with far more progressive direction. Songs like Island or Iron Tusk more played to the roots of their primary sound, and would feel at home next to their earlier album Remission. However, hearing it juxtaposed with the grandiose complexity of I Am Ahab, Megalodon or Aqua Dementia feels like the band’s path was already laid out ahead of them. This is not to say that the album is disjointed, far from! In fact the cohesion of this record flows one song effortlessly into the next, constantly pulling you towards the grand conclusion of the instrumental track Joseph Merrick. It is clear to see from this vantage the direction the band would pursue later in the form of Crack The Skye and Emperor Of Sand. When Leviathan was concluded the band stayed onstage for a brief collection of their other fan favorites More Than I Could Chew, Circle Of Cysquatch, and the almighty Steambreather. Finally though, drummer Brann Dailor took to the microphone at the front of the stage and said some words in regards to his friends in Lamb Of God. Recalling the time he met them (as Burn The Priest) while he was living at the recording studio they would be mixing in. He finally explained the surreal moment when he realized they simultaneously released both Leviathan and Ashes Of The Wake while standing in Best Buy back in 2004. This he concluded, is what brought this tour together.
Members
Brann Dailor – drums, percussion (2000–present), backing vocals (2005–present), lead vocals (2008–present)
Brent Hinds – lead guitar, backing vocals (2000–present), lead vocals (2001–present)
Bill Kelliher – rhythm guitar, backing vocals (2000–present)
Troy Sanders – bass, keyboards, backing vocals (2000–present), lead vocals (2001–present)
Setlist
Leviathan
Blood and Thunder
I Am Ahab
Seabeast
Ísland
Iron Tusk
Megalodon
Naked Burn
Aqua Dementia
Hearts Alive
Joseph Merrick
Encore:
More Than I Could Chew
Circle of Cysquatch
Steambreather
MASTODON
At the end of the night, the curtain was raised one last time for Lamb of God and the intro music started to swell as the band took their positions for the groundbreaking revisit of Ashes Of The Wake. A tension hung in the air as Fans knew any moment the guitars would hiss to life and kick off the rampage. With a crash, the curtain dropped and Mark Morton and Willie Adler’s fretwork lit up the opening riff to Laid To Rest. Randy Blythe skulked around the stage, his unearthly growl setting off a circle pit from the North Texas crowd. Again, reviewing this album retrospectively, it is amazing to see the effects it had rippling through the genre. Virtually every Metalcore band of the mid to late 2000’s was shaped by these tracks, and in many ways it serves as a ground zero for the rise of Deathcore. I’m not sure there was any great revelations of this album in regards to the next 20 years of the band’s existence, but it does feel like the proper game changer. More polished than As The Palaces Burn but not the mainstream push that was Sacrament, Ashes by contrast is just pure and nasty Lamb Of God. Whether it is the sonic air raid of Faded Line or the groove laced Break You, this album is still an audio attack on the metal landscape and there is a reason much of this album still lands in the regular setlist. At the end of the record’s revisit, the band lit up the stage once again with the later favorite, Memento Mori. With one more song left to go, Randy Blythe told the crowd how he went to a cemetery to pay respects to Pantera’s Abbott brothers, and was dedicating the last song, Redneck, of the night to their memory. North Texas did not miss the opportunity, and the circle pit erupted one last time, sending everyone out the doors on a good note.
Band
John Campbell – bass (1994–present)
Mark Morton – lead guitar (1994, 1997–present)[155][156]
Willie Adler – rhythm guitar (1999–present, US only 2022–present)
Randy Blythe – vocals (1995–present)
Art Cruz – drums
Setlist
Laid to Rest
Hourglass
Now You’ve Got Something To Die For
Faded Line
Omerta
Blood Of The Scribe
One Gun
Break You
What I’ve Become
Ashes Of The Wake
Remorse Is For The Dead
Momento Mori
Redneck
LAMB OF GOD
