Children of Bodom @ The BigTop, Luna Park, Sydney(12/11/11)

Wed 16th Nov, 2011 in Gig Reviews

Rarely does an opening act truly win over an audience in realm of metal, let alone in the incredibly elitist world of melodic death metal. This however, is exactly what Sydneysiders Darkest Half achieved in an impressive thirty minutes. Sitting somewhere in between the epic power metal stylings of Hammerfall and the doom laden thrash of Nevermore, the local quartet painted a dark yet melodic canvas that was complemented perfectly by the unbelievable vocal range of frontman Vo Simpson, the sum of which left the few brave punters who’d arrived early in awe of an spectacular shred laden performance from the relatively unknown support.

Adopting a more electronic approach to modern power metal fused with the structure and technicality of progressive metal, Perth quintet Voyager were next up and took to the stage for an intense yet professional set that has garnered them critical acclaim across the world. With the virtuosic soloing of Simone Dow weaving intricate melodies around the angelic vocal leads from pianist Danny Estrin to form masterful works within the realm of prog. Although both ironically and entertainingly the high point of their set would come within a keytar infused 80s flashback of sorts of which the band seemed to be loving every minute, with flashes of Van Halen’s Jump, ACDC’s You Shook Me All Night Long and both the Beverly Hills Cop and Ghostbusters theme breaking up the band’s brief yet dense set.

Whilst after two opening acts the Big Top may have barely reached a third of capacity, the reality was that it was finally time for what every metalhead in the room had been waiting for – a decisively brutal yet subtly melodic performance from the kings of melodic death metal, Children of Bodom.

As the diehard audience had expected, Alexi Laiho and his Hate crew unquestionably delivered, with drummer Jaska Raatikainen deafeningly laying the rhythmic foundation for the raucous and incredibly intense Relentless Reckless Forever, with Laiho commandeering the attention of every fan in the room through a combination of lead work and hoarse screaming that the Finnish metallers are renowned for.

Wasting no time the band powered straight into the classic Are You Dead Yet, taking the technicality, volume and brutality of the bands performance to the next level, with fans displaying an expected bias towards older material. The most prevalent example of this came with Laiho questioning whether the audience wanted to hear some “Old School Bodom”, before launching into a medley of the rarely heard Deadnight Warrior and Children of Bodom, unusually touching upon the bands first album Something Wild, of which Laiho has claimed to possess a strong dislike as a result of the strong neoclassical influence upon the bands early writing.

Above all, perhaps the most noticeable aspect from the audience’s perspective has to be the truly immense energy consistently displayed by the band, that continued to increase with every song building towards a spectacular climax of the melodic Angels Don’t Kill giving way to the all out Bodom classic Downfall. With a fairly diverse choice in material that spanned the melo-death metallers fifteen year odd career executed almost perfectly, albeit at absolutely deafening levels, the die-hard fanbase who braved the excessive ticket price could have quite feasibly left blown away.

But of course no metal show would be complete without an encore, which in this instance oddly kicked off with the driving title track of the band’s previous album Blooddrunk, once again showcasing the ridiculous technical ability of the band and particularly keyboardist Janne Wirman, whilst shattering the ears of the audience with thunderous double kicks on the part of Raatikainen.

With one last heavily accented speech to the audience, Laiho implored the Sydney Hate Crew to “Lose their Shit”, with the glissando like harp intro to Hate Crew Deathtoll -catalysing a sea of flying arms, legs, fists and heads in one of the smallest, yet violent mosh pits Luna Park has ever seen. Bringing one of Sydney’s most memorable melodic death metal gigs to a close.