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| (DEMON) - SEVEN
WITCHES - IRON FIRE - AXTRA |
 Biebob
- Vosselaar (B)
April
9th 2006
http://www.the-demon.com/
http://www.sevenwitches.net/
http://www.ironfire.dk/
http://www.axtra.it/
Nico
and I had missed a couple of Seven Witches tours
and it had been 4 years since we saw them - high time to
check them out and see Jack Frost again! We were
esp. excited, because new in the line-up is the mighty
Alan Tecchio (Hades)! Demon isn't really
our thing, but Iron Fire I really wanted to see,
because I've been a big fan of Martin Steene
since he's in Force Of Evil (with Hank Shermann and
Michael Denner) as well. Iron Fire's new CD also
pleasantly surprised me. And as a bonus the package
opened with an Italian Megadeth
coverband.
AXTRA started in front of an
almost empty venue around 7pm. The Italians performed
well nevertheless and did get  applauded by those who were there already.
Eddie T.H. Mustaine's voice comes pretty close to
Dave's, although it's less nasal, but I doubt anyone
could sound the same. When the visitors cheered after he
asked if we liked Britney Spears ("You like Britney,
huh? In what way?" ;)), they started "Anarchy In The
UK" in a very poppy way, but of course after a
minute or so it turned into the punksong as we know it.
After that Axtra promised to be back in October,
as they are planning on bringing the ex-Megadeth drummer
Nick Menza along!
setlist Axtra:
Skin O' My
Teeth
Wake Up Dead
Symphony Of
Destruction
Peace Sells
Anarchy In The
UK
 Finally a chance to see one of my favorite
vocalists, Martin Steene, live, yeaahh! I was
never a big fan of IRON FIRE's power metal, but I
was pleasantly surprised with their new album
"Revenge". There are some "happy" songs, but also
a lot of midtempo epic tracks that aren't that far away
from similar Force Of Evil tracks. And judging from this
live set, I guess I need to check on Iron Fire's
back catalogue again too. And I certainly love
Martin's voice (I was able to tell him that
afterwards and take some pics), even though I still like
the somewhat more aggressive approach with Force Of Evil
a bit better. Anyway, no need to complain - seeing and
hearing him live was awesome! Though the seeing was a
bit of a shock to me, as I didn't know yet that the
tall, slim Dane had traded his long blond hair in for a
short black haircut! The hearing part was all I hoped
for! The hall was pretty empty still, but Martin
did his best to get us to sing along. Among the songs
were some new ones: "Winds Of Rage", the pounding
"Metal Messiah" and "Savage Prophecy", but
also some oldies like "Prince Of Agony" of "On
The Edge" and from the debut they did the classic
"Thunderstorm", where Martin actually
managed to get a loud "thunderstorm" back from the
(still small) crowd. Well done!
 My personal headliner of the day
was SEVEN WITCHES. I've been a huge fan since
their debut in 1999. I actually met Jack Frost
here in the Biebob for the first time in that year, when
he was touring with Metalium. I went up to him, saying
that I was dying to meet him, because I was such a
Seven Witches fan - he was surprised, but happy
;) Unfortunately I have never seen them with the awesome
Bobby "Leather Lungs" Lucas (now in Overlorde and
Exhibition), but Jack always had a good nose for
vocal talent. We did see them with Wade Black, but not with
James Rivera. Not that we need to be sorry for that,
because I was very excited to hear that none other than
the vocal legend of Hades fame, Alan Tecchio, had
joined the Seven Witches ranks! And woah, did he
deliver! I just love the man's voice and to hear him
sing "Mental Messiah", "Second War In
Heaven" (pointing at my Second War t-shirt),
"Xiled To Infinity And One", "Metal
Tyrant", the beautiful and emotional "Passage To
The Other Side" (I can't listen to this song without
tearing up) or the Priest classics "Grinder" and
"Victim Of Changes" was just awesome!
Jack's performance was better than ever too, I
think for the whole show I've just looked at Alan
and Jack, haha! A great team!
 We once saw part of a DEMON
gig at Wacken and were bored... so we didn't expect much
tonight and spend some time catchiing up with Jack
(thanks for taking care of us again, bro!) and meeting
Alan. Nico went to the front to take some pics and we
both did notice that this gig wasn't boring at all!
Well, their hardrock was musically still not my cup of
tea, but there was a lot of action (and posing) on stage
and the atmosphere among the visitors seemed good too.
The sound was powerful and the show was very tight and
professional. Still we payed more attention to our
friend and left a bit earlier for the drive home and a
fair amount of sleep before the next working day
;)
submitted by Marlies 24.04.2006
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