HAIL THE KINGS!!! (Soulfly - Live)

Member Name: Jakeball

Product:	Soulfly - Live
Date:	24/03/03 (174 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Inspired Set List, Amazing Peformance, Great Atmosphere

Disadvantages: NONE AT ALL!!!!!

Hah! I was at the Soulfly gig at the Garage in Glasgow on Saturday and it was amazing! Not just amazing like you'd expect a Soulfly gig to be but REALLY amazing!!! Like i'm sure i've said before, my ideal gig would be the original Sepultura - but this was definitely the next best thing!

Stampin' Ground were the support and put on an awesome, energetic show, managing to please the rabid crowd in the process. Highlights included the singer standing with one foot on the stage and one foot on the security rail as he got different members of the audience to sing different lines of a song and an inspired cover of Sepultura's 'Beneath the Remains' which went down well with an audience obviously acquainted with Max's earlier work (as frontman of Sepultura and Nailbomb).

The tension built as the crowd stood about for a good 25 minutes after Stampin' Ground, eagerly awaiting Soulfly. This built and built until the sound of a digeredoo played through the PA sent the place fucking mental! Then, sure enough, Soulfly took the stage and launched into 'Downstroy'. Which was nice. 'Seek and Strike' followed, pleasing diehard metal fans and recent converts alike. Due to the airplay it's been receiving on Kerrang (and due to the fact that it's one of the only decent songs on a terrible, terrible channel) this was one that the entire crowd knew.

I had expected them to play stuff from their new album, what I wasn't expecting was something far, far better. The band proceeded to launch into 'Arise', an old Sepultura song that sent the place completely fucking nuts!!! They then followed this up with 'Dead Embryonic Cells', the next track on the same album (Arise). This was followed by a couple more Sepultura classics -'Spit' and 'Refuse/Resist' and even a track from Max's little known 'Nailbomb' album - 'Wasting Away'. These were all
moshpit pleasers and exactly what I wanted from this gig! The rest of the performance consisted of savage renditions of 'Fire', 'Bring It', the start of 'Jumpdafuckup', an amazing tribal drum jam that you could even headbang to!, the start of 'Headup' (complete with strobe lights and 'Soulfy!' chants), 'Brazil', a frenetic 'Last Of The Mohicans', a great version of 'the Prophet', an amazing 'Back to The Primitive', a crowd pleasing, brutal cover version of Nirvana's 'Lithium' and a truly awesome, extended version of 'Eye for an Eye' which was the icing on the cake.

I was really getting into this and it looked like the band were as well. Mikey Doling was a mass of black hair and grins as he thrashed about with his guitar - and the ex-Snot man didn't play a bum note all night. Max was obviously enjoying himself, the bassist (Marcello D Rap) played a note perfect set (and was a spectacle throughout) and the drummer (Ray Morgana) was simply amazing - the best drummer since Igor Cavalera! The band were super-tight, an example of this was when Max's mic stopped working (I think he blew several throughout the gig) halfway through 'Fire' and he walked off the stage. The band started a really cool, seamless jam until he came back on with a fresh mic and launched straight back into the song (delivering one of the best death screams i've ever heard in the process). Far from detracting from the song, it made it a bit special.

The crowd were obviously loving it too, never failing to scream along when Max prompted, mosh or generally show their appreciation. The atmosphere was great, the songs were amazing, the set list was inspired and the band put on a great, top class performance that they really looked like they enjoyed. This gig was near perfect and left me buzzing all night. It's going to be hard to top this one....

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