While there’s nothing wrong with the Tufnell Park Dome as a venue per se, and the alcohol prices are very reasonable, it’s just a bit off the beaten track, especially for those of us who have to travel back through central London. That’s the only reason I can come up with for the poor Friday night turnout at this gig for the excellent Orphaned Land.
The sound for opening band Mylidian was awful; the drums were so dominant in the mix that it made everything else difficult to hear with any clarity, especially the vocals during the verses, which were often little more than a muffled hum in the background. The choruses fared slightly better, with the two singers lifting the volume and going toe to toe with those drums.
Mylidian play a modern-sounding take on symphonic metal, the emphasis firmly on the ‘metal’ part, with harsh vocals provided by the single-named “Armendar” and clean, female singing courtesy of Chaoss Heidi . They put in a good performance deserving of a bigger audience and hopefully won over a few of those who did make the effort to arrive early enough to catch their set. Heidi has a good presence, in part no doubt due to her enormous height, and must have been sewn into the trousers she wore on stage. Remarkably, she didn’t seem to be in pain.
Picks of Mylidian’s set were probably “Hell’s Hunter” and final song, “Monastery Slaughter”, the latter with great riffs, some awesome bass that could actually be picked out and a memorable chorus.
The “angel vs demon” vocal approach has been used by a multitude of bands now, but France’s Silent Opera do it pretty well, with one of the finest angels around, along with a bloody good demon. Laure Laborde is an accomplished soprano and her beautiful voice stands up brilliantly in the live environment. Steven Schriver has a truly … um … demonic style and may well have been gargling broken glass before the gig.
Silent Opera play gothic death metal, with some progressive touches. There were impressive sections in most of their songs, but many of them lacked a little cohesion and flow.
There’s no setlist available, but “Dorian” (I think it was that one) had catchy rhythm guitar sections and a great guitar solo. “Dawn of The Fool” was the standout of Silent Opera’s set, with great riffs, some lovely piano (not played live, but in its recorded form) and the best example of stunning operatic warbling contrasted with demonic howls. The song had the flow that it felt many of the others were missing.
The final track, “Sailor, Siren and Bitterness”, is also worth a mention, as it really got heads moving and featured a rousing, catchy chorus.
Steven Schriver put in a great shift and was an absolute lunatic throughout, bringing incredible energy and enthusiasm to The Dome. He seemed to be having a great time up there, which radiated to the audience, who seemed to enjoy this young French band.
Onto our headliners, Israel’s mighty Orphaned Land. The tour is a celebration of the 10-year anniversary of their death metal / traditional Israeli music masterpiece, Mabool – The Story of the Three Sons of Seven, so although they played almost every track from that release, they resisted the temptation to jump on the “play a classic album from start to finish” bandwagon.
Some people have to work at entertaining a crowd, whereas some just have natural charisma. Orphaned Land’s frontman Kobi Fahri sits comfortably in the latter category and has perfect rapport with the crowd from the instant he steps on stage.
First track, “Halo Dies”, in the opinion of this reviewer the strongest on Mabool, is a belter to start us off, a great balance between brutal death metal heaviness and more melodic traditional music, with hugely catchy instrumental sections. Kobi’s vocals were, of course, impeccable although I’m not completely certain that he delivered all of the harsh vocals live on the night – there seemed to be moments when growls and microphone were out of sync, but I’m happy to be corrected!
Orphaned Land’s message is all about unity. It doesn’t matter what background people have, there’s no need for them to kill each other. It’s hard to take issue with that, or the view that those in charge often make things a lot worse, so Fahri’s defiant cry of, “fuck politicians” was greeted with roars of approval from the audience.
As well as heaviness, Orphaned Land’s music features its fair share of melody. “All Is One” conveys real emotion and had the crowd swaying rather than moshing. “Ocean Land” features a hugely catchy chorus with heartfelt delivery from Fahri, as well as a great guitar solo.
The inevitable encore started with Mabool‘s powerful title track, which is towards the heavier end of the band’s range, but with upbeat, high pitched, almost poppy vocals at times. As usual, the low point of the night was when the band took their leave (following, as their support acts had done, the obligatory ‘selfie with the audience’ shot).
A great night, there’s no better live band touring these days as far as I’m concerned. My only criticism is a purely selfish one – I’ve seen Orphaned Land twice in just over a year and on neither occasion have they played “The Warrior”. Maybe next year, fellas? Please?
