And Then Satan Said "Let There Be Real Metal"

And he ushered in ICONOCLAST CONTRA, Salt Lake's own voice of the heathen; and he arranged it so that Alabama's own sinister sons in BLOODSTAINED DUSK were to perform as well as Detroit's Nocturnal Fear, which verily had a slow start and served to be made a mockery of by being told by the Zodiac to Shut The F**k Up several times until they suddenly played a Sodom cover, by which on a dime they were Forgiven at least for the duration of that song if not for a short time thereafter; and finally, the dark one made it so that Finland's own notorious practitioners of the unholy art of wielding sonic terror HORNA were to headline, they whose credo is Destroy Human Life (for the fine practitioners in Horna are not NS but rather, hate us all equally).

Having set this show up strategically to not only take place the day after The Sword/Down/Metallica show played, but lo, and behold, on the very day of our US Election; yes, Satan himself did get a chuckle from the rafters as this show was set in the stone of eternity, to wreak audial terror in the hearts and minds of the initiated who so dared to dismiss the utterly pointless shenanigans of the election race details, and to abolish all thoughts thereof.

And so it was with great finesse and anticipation that we, Salt Lake's own disposable heroes, The Horde and its few stalwart stragglers dared to venture into Club Vegas on the night of November 4, 2008, to patently ignore the election results and instead devote ourselves fully to the practice of imbibing strong alcoholic spirits whilst being subjected to the unholiest of musical onslaughts.



Tony from Iconoclast Contra
helter skelter at his kit again


ICONOCLAST CONTRA started up the evening in a chaotic frenzy, and to these ears they never sounded better. Tony's murderous drumming can only be described as "helter skelter", frenetically accentuating the restless and unhinged nature of the band's playing. Ricky the Gorepig's goatee alone was more metal than Rob Trujillo himself, and that is indisputable fact. Despite encountering some problems with his bass and the soundguy's manipulations, Iconoclast Contra's intensity of effort prevailed, while LD wielded sporadic razor sharp soloes of a nature which would enwrap Kirk Hammet in an ever-tightening barbed wire trap, and Anthony the Zodiac leered into his microphone with such hatred that it disturbed even his closest friends and acquaintances, including me, to the point we all gave him a slightly wider berth. Iconoclast Contra last night sounded very tight indeed, and their style of music has evolved into a unique sounding hybrid that can only be described as successfully bonding elements of thrash, black, death, and even hardcore punk and speed in their attitude and original melding of these styles. Really they are outside the boundaries of normal metal categorization, which I think is where they are bound to excell and seperate themselves from the rest of the pack.

Ricky continued to cut his beefy arms into crisscroosed scars and at the end of their set, was standing in a puddle of his own blood. After they left the stage, some guy came out and mopped it all up. I didn't notice whether Anthony had cut himself yet -- I'm sure he did, but I was paying attention to the band as a whole half the time, and the other half I was talking with friends, making the rounds, and getting more beers. Later in the show after Horna finished, Anthony loomed out of the crowd up at me with a horrific gash in his forehead, and he looked really possessed out of his mind. I told Tony how great they sounded and was informed, as usual, how much the sound guy screwed everything up, and I had to reiterate to him that in all honesty, despite those problems, I thought they pulled off the best sounding set I'd heard yet. It was just the right degree of being frenetically out of control.

Next up was Detroit's NOCTURNAL FEAR, and they played a pretty generic set of standard deathmetal with shades of black, which is when Anthony kept yelling "Shut the f**k up" at them. Then suddenly, on a dime, they launch into this Sodom song that Iconoclast themselves had just played, and Anthony's negative disposition to the band did a 180 as he fled up to the stage to fist-pump them on. Then after that cover was over, the few who paid homage up front dispersed back to their tables and various corners to nurse their PBR pitchers and whiskey shots.


Bloodstained Dusk

Finally Alabama's BLOODSTAINED DUSK went on, and these guys were the real deal in terms of USBM. With corpsepaint and spiked armbands, to set the mood, the best part about them was their music. Truer to this metal, it abandoned thrash for a veritably blackened symphonic approach that I can only describe as desparingly beautiful. Soaring, atmospheric palettes of corruption boiled over and coalesced to create an ironically soothing wall of annihilation enhanced by ulutating vocals of demonic despair. I was entranced. Bloodstained Dusk were majestic, and my favorites of the night, which was antithetical to most of my companions in the Horde's tastes, who were unequivocally for HORNA.


Horna shatters the night with soulkilling black death

And it did not stop HORNA from taking the stage and proving why their popularity in blackmetal is nearly unmatched. These guys have been around for fifteen years, hailing from Finland around 1993. And despite the various inevitable lineup changes, they still deliver the true spirit of blackmetal today like few other bands can. I'd have to say I liked them a little better than Watain. Horna just took the stage and delivered straight up sonic devastation, as ordered. Our songs arrived blackened and full of hate. Our ears were pummeled mightily. Devilhorns did thrust from the crowd. Beers were spilled, glasses smashed. Cutters cut themselves and the staff held back behind the protection of their bar's countertop. Ricky the Gorepig later told me that after their set, while he was still rather heavily bleeding from his slashed arms, one of the members of Horna approached him backstage, and said "I want you to pleeze bleed on me" and he pulled out these white garbs and donned them to bring out the blood imprints. These were a real fun bunch of guys, and we partied like it was sixteen-ninety-seven. While the rest of the world was tuned in to Obama's obvious winning final stretch, we shunned politics entirely in favor of total anti-human metal. Long live Satan \m/

photography by Mathilda of NEX CULTUS PHOTOGRAPHY
http://myspace.com/nexcultusphotography