Vader
Arts Centre, Colchester
27 February 2010

Korvus kick off proceedings tonight and despite the limited crowd they go down well with those who are there. Although this was only their second gig with the new line up it rarely showed, although vocalist Sam Korvus does at time look a little lost without his guitar. That however is a minor issue and one that will be sorted in time. All in all an impressive start to the evening.

Next up are Divine Chaos who unleash their brand of thrash metal in impressive fashion. As a live entity they are pretty good and they go down rather well with the crowd tonight. Lead singer Benny F is energetic and enthusiastic, while the rest of the band is far from static. The problem however is not with what they do on stage, rather with what they play. At the present moment their material is just not good enough.

‘Reflections’ the debut album from As You Drown is a decent effort however on this night the band fail to deliver live. The fact that the crowd just weren’t in to them for whatever reason didn’t help and kind of dampened the spirits of both parties. But in truth As You Drown just didn’t put on a show tonight, they turned up, played and left. A real disappointment.

Vader however were on top form tonight and they needed to be, because this gig was becoming rather flat and lifeless after the indifferent support bands. Judging by the crowds reaction tonight was only going to be about Vader. As the band hurtled through the best from their back catalogue as well as the highlights from latest album ‘Necropolis’ this became even more evident. This was a display of death metal of the highest quality and it’s a good job it was. Vader were the band people came to see if they hadn’t delivered it would have left a lot of people very disappointed.

Review by Simon Douglass