Bullet For My Valentine, Still Remains @ Brixton Academy, London
7th February 2008
Being hung out to dry isn’t a great start for a gig. But that’s where I found myself the day beforehand when the driving force behind attending this show cancels, tut tut. Nethertheless I manage to scrape together a replacement in the form of the Docktor (What a legend for doing this!!).
Waiting around outside I couldn’t help but notice the extremely young age of all that flocked towards the academy this eve, all clapped out in copycat dark brooding goth outfits. I also stood out from the crowd in the respect that I was old enough to purchase alcohol without having to borrow daddy’s clothes and drop my vocal tone fourfold, great, empty bar! This youthful energy and enthusiasm however hindered our progress into the arena given the queue was the biggest I’ve ever seen it, and even an hour after door there was still a sizable queue.
Now that we’d finally got in we’d missed the majority of the support acts, we did however catch the tail end of Still Remains. These American punks with pianos sounded really good. Their sound was straddling the cusp of breaking into a metal frenzy but was being gently restrained by polished melodies and pop heavy hooks. The marriage of metal and synth worked surprisingly well and my liking of it was a bit of a shock. What really amused me was the fact that as much as you want to look like a metal warrior, when your standing behind a keyboard tickling ivory… you just look extremely camp, im sorry but its true. I’d beg you to find one burly piano player who looks even remotely scary rocking out, hehe. Still now all that Remains is the tour toppers!
The towering twin peak guitar wielding brutes of the Bullet For My Valentine gang stood casting a shadow over the teeny crowd who have already wet themselves in anticipation. The Over The Top white sheet that was hoist in front of the stage is dropped to the delight of the crowd, who proceeded to wet themselves a bit more.
BFMV kick start a decent set of metal mayhem with the title track from their latest album Scream Aim Fire. With this LP only being released this week it was tricky to get to know the songs in advance. Still they sounded beefy and full or exuberant metal shards of brilliance. Big guitars were the name of the game and their playing was, it has to be said, outstanding. The vocals stood up remarkable well considering the amped counterbalance which gave them an edge over the run of the mill metal band.
There is no doubting their technical abilities and as metal goes these tracks were pretty good with highlights in the shape of 4 words (To Choke Upon), Tears Don’t Fall and Waking The Demons. To the young metallers here these guys were gods, I don’t think they quite reach that accolade yet but they are paving their way.
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