Up-Load UK, Gigs News & reviews Lamb Of God Review

The Academy is buzzing on this wet and rainy Saturday night. Lamb Of God have a fanatical following but the inclusion of Devildriver on this bill, making their UK debut, gives an extra charge to this sold out show.

The atmosphere is electric as Dez Fafara and his band assault the stage with their thunderous wall of sound. Pounding swirling rhythms and whirling windmilling hair fire up the crowd as Dez glares maniacally out at the crowd, his cut off Motorhead shirt a stark contrast to the industrial fetish apparel of Coal Chamber, his previous band. “How many people know who we are?” is met with a roar of approval from the Manchester crowd resulting in a huge grin from the larger than life frontman. A frenzied pit is well underway as they charge through “I Could Care Less”, prompting Dez to comment “Bad ass little pit – I live for that shit!”. The pits are pretty constant throughout, the frontman eventually directing the throng to mark out the boundaries of a circle pit that consumes the whole hall. “Remember, if anyone falls down, pick em up and leave that emo martial arts crap out” he cautions before exploding again into an aural assault that picks the place up and spits everyone out used, abused, battered and bruised. The set ends all too soon, Devildriver leave the stage having made their mark and planted the flag of approval firmly on the Manchester stage. A return with headlining status surely cannot be far away.

The crowd thins slightly, some people obviously here only for Devildriver but Lamb Of Gods following is equally fanatical. A roadie, tired of the usual “one-two” leads the crowd in a chant of “Fuck Stryper” (A leading light in the Christian Metal scene), which morphs into “Lamb Of God, Lamb Of God”.

A tolling bell starts an almost sacrificial intro, and out of the fog of dry ice silhouettes loom and launch into a thunderous wall of noise, the crowd warmed up to boiling point by Devildriver are up for it from the off. “Manchester, you’re rowdy motherfuckers!” leads us into “Now You’ve Got Something To Die For”. The pits are there, but sporadic as if the earlier bands have drained their energy. They’re still intense though, and go all the way to the back of the room. Through occasional gaps in the fog the band can be glimpsed throwing themselves into the sonic battering ram that is the Lamb Of God sound. An old Burn The Priest song, “Bloodletting”, is given a rapturous welcome and hits you between the ears for it’s brief length. Horns are thrown and huge pits surface again and again before the set is over and everyone staggers out through the doors into the cold and rain that has been long forgotten.