Arch Enemy is a bit of an international band of musicians that are still based out of Sweden for all intents and purposes even when most of its current members are not Swedes. They’ve been a band for some twenty five years and even if they didn’t try too hard the inclusion of a “woman” in a fledgling up-and-coming band back in the early 00’s was a stroke of genius that catapulted them to the forefront of the magazines and afforded them popularity that other melodic death bands from Sweden have never been afforded (the few heroic one’s that haven’t gone the pop or asshole route).
I must admit that quickly I lost interest in Arch Enemy when Angela Gossow entered their ranks as I did like their Liiva days and I only consider a couple of albums that they did with her as remotely interesting, but that would really put me in a minority of people, but still I thought that hiring the much more versatile Alissa White-Gluz on the recommendation of their former singer, who remains active as the band manager, was quite an ingenious move.
Further cementing their status was the inclusion of the popular American guitar slinger Jeff Loomis (ex-Nevermore), who narrowly missed a chance to join Megadeth due to that and has now been reduced to a little bit more that a decorative next to Michael Amott, not allowed to contribute to the band’s material. That being said, he was still a good “transfer”.
Now regarding their show in Athens, they had a Ukrainian band called Jinjer as opener, who are hard to describe exactly as it 4 years and 3 albums they have been shape-shifting between Nu metal, towards death and then groove-metal/core with often melodic pop vocals. Think Messugah fronted by a chick. All talented, but a little too all over the place, with the most interesting aspect being the melodic parts of certain songs… because the many layers of their music were for the most part drowned in a very boomy-bass laden sound that painted their aural canvas in rather bleak terms. Still they delivered their set of 9 songs, “Who’s Gonna Be the One”, “Words of Wisdom”, “Sit Stay Roll Over”, “I Speak Astronomy” (not astrology – too bad – I was curious about my sign), “Just Another”, “Pisces”, “Captain Clock”, “No Hoard of Value”, “Bad Water”, with aplomb and manage to get a portion of the crowd with them and another one – drooling over their frontwoman... oh well, celebrity crushes are not too uncommon in teenagers.
Still, the main event was Arch Enemy and they rolled out, about a quarter after ten, delivering some quite flawless and well-choreographed/orchestrated death metal, with a tendency for melody.
The lights went down and the entirety of “Thunderstruck” by AC/DC was played to allow the band to get ready, who took their place during the taped intro of “Set Flame to the Night”. For a storming entry with “The World is Yours” and a blast to the past with “Ravenous”… the clarity and balance of power in the sound, the performances, especially Gluz’s non-stop energetic thrashing around for a good portion of the show were something that had to be seen to be believed. Perfect in form…
There was quite a conscious effort in the rest of the show to cover quite a bit of the past without losing the focus from the current reincarnation. The selection of songs, which included a further seven or so from the latter two albums, like “War Eternal”, “You Will Know My Name”, “As the Pages Burn”, “The Race”, the most recent and highly melodious “The Eagle Flies Alone”, which might act as the precursor to a more accessible version of the band soon to arrive with more clean vocals and “Avalanche” during the encore, is not something random, by any means, still they managed to include a healthy dose of older material like “Stolen Life”, “My Apocalypse”, “Blood in the Water”, “Burning Angel”, the crowd pleasing “No Gods, No Masters” and “Dead Bury Their Dead”, as well as the ferocious and upstarting “We Will Rise” right before the encore, which included other than the aforementioned “Avalanche”, the very Michael Schencher inspired instrumental “Snow Bound”, as well as “Nemesis” and the classic closer “Fields of Desolation” from “Black Earth” signaling the finale of the gig.
Frontwoman Allisa WG did a fine job delivering songs from all eras of the band and adapting them to her own style, which she slightly modified towards a more flat and extreme version to be able and deliver consistently without compromising the amount of stage jumping and thrashing around that she did which was… a lot. The entire band was flawless and if one can blame them for something, that could be the homogeneity and luck of invention. The band is too “safe”, which obviously after such a long time is paying dividends, but makes everything rather predictable and could only be shaken by some really off the wall change in the sound and direction that might or might not come in the future… but I must say that the present looks and sounds damn fine impressive. Well done then.
Further cementing their status was the inclusion of the popular American guitar slinger Jeff Loomis (ex-Nevermore), who narrowly missed a chance to join Megadeth due to that and has now been reduced to a little bit more that a decorative next to Michael Amott, not allowed to contribute to the band’s material. That being said, he was still a good “transfer”.
Now regarding their show in Athens, they had a Ukrainian band called Jinjer as opener, who are hard to describe exactly as it 4 years and 3 albums they have been shape-shifting between Nu metal, towards death and then groove-metal/core with often melodic pop vocals. Think Messugah fronted by a chick. All talented, but a little too all over the place, with the most interesting aspect being the melodic parts of certain songs… because the many layers of their music were for the most part drowned in a very boomy-bass laden sound that painted their aural canvas in rather bleak terms. Still they delivered their set of 9 songs, “Who’s Gonna Be the One”, “Words of Wisdom”, “Sit Stay Roll Over”, “I Speak Astronomy” (not astrology – too bad – I was curious about my sign), “Just Another”, “Pisces”, “Captain Clock”, “No Hoard of Value”, “Bad Water”, with aplomb and manage to get a portion of the crowd with them and another one – drooling over their frontwoman... oh well, celebrity crushes are not too uncommon in teenagers.
Still, the main event was Arch Enemy and they rolled out, about a quarter after ten, delivering some quite flawless and well-choreographed/orchestrated death metal, with a tendency for melody.
The lights went down and the entirety of “Thunderstruck” by AC/DC was played to allow the band to get ready, who took their place during the taped intro of “Set Flame to the Night”. For a storming entry with “The World is Yours” and a blast to the past with “Ravenous”… the clarity and balance of power in the sound, the performances, especially Gluz’s non-stop energetic thrashing around for a good portion of the show were something that had to be seen to be believed. Perfect in form…
There was quite a conscious effort in the rest of the show to cover quite a bit of the past without losing the focus from the current reincarnation. The selection of songs, which included a further seven or so from the latter two albums, like “War Eternal”, “You Will Know My Name”, “As the Pages Burn”, “The Race”, the most recent and highly melodious “The Eagle Flies Alone”, which might act as the precursor to a more accessible version of the band soon to arrive with more clean vocals and “Avalanche” during the encore, is not something random, by any means, still they managed to include a healthy dose of older material like “Stolen Life”, “My Apocalypse”, “Blood in the Water”, “Burning Angel”, the crowd pleasing “No Gods, No Masters” and “Dead Bury Their Dead”, as well as the ferocious and upstarting “We Will Rise” right before the encore, which included other than the aforementioned “Avalanche”, the very Michael Schencher inspired instrumental “Snow Bound”, as well as “Nemesis” and the classic closer “Fields of Desolation” from “Black Earth” signaling the finale of the gig.
Frontwoman Allisa WG did a fine job delivering songs from all eras of the band and adapting them to her own style, which she slightly modified towards a more flat and extreme version to be able and deliver consistently without compromising the amount of stage jumping and thrashing around that she did which was… a lot. The entire band was flawless and if one can blame them for something, that could be the homogeneity and luck of invention. The band is too “safe”, which obviously after such a long time is paying dividends, but makes everything rather predictable and could only be shaken by some really off the wall change in the sound and direction that might or might not come in the future… but I must say that the present looks and sounds damn fine impressive. Well done then.
