My Dying Bride
(La2, Saturday 4 November 2000)Recently, I decided to go to London to watch a gig from My Dying Bride. Since I believe a live gig of the only doom metal band that is popular to a wide metal audience is an important cultural event for doom metal fans, I decided to share my experiences with you, doom freaks all over the internet. The day started very doomy: the guys with whom I would go to the concert didn't show up due to a misunderstanding. Since it is not my habit to go all alone to a metal concert, -especially not in a foreign country- I felt embittered, frustrated, disappointed and depressed. With other words: I was in the perfect mood to watch My Dying Bride playing live. I was lucky though. La2, the small hall (maximum: 800 persons...) where the concert would take place, was full of Greeks. I started to talk with the most fanatic ones amongst them and so I found good company and a standing place in the first row (my regards to Yannis, Spyros, Giorgos and the others).
The opening band was Green lizard, a sympathetic but completely unoriginal quintet from The Netherlands. They played trendy metal in the vein of Korn, Coal Chamber... the sympathetic singer was an expert in weird facial expressions that reminded me of Björk. Since he also had of those little eyes I wondered if he was her brother or something. Anyway, their enthousiasm made up for their lack of originality.
The Gathering followed. Also from the Netherlands, but much more original and experimental, they drove the audience crazy with their dreamy, trippy music and the enchanting appearance of Anneke (those who stood in the first row like me know what I'm talking about...). I didn't recognize many songs from their previous album 'How to measure a planet' (ehm... maybe because I heard it only once) but they played a lot of new material from their latest opus 'if_then_else'. Of course they also played the obligatory hits 'Strange machines' and 'Nighttime birds' where the audience started jumping like mad. Once I heard that the English public is not enthousiastic at all, what I witnessed was quite the opposite, though.
By the time My Dying Bride did their dark appearance on stage, La2 was so full I couldn't even lift my arm. "Buena sierra" Aaron said and the public looked a bit puzzled. But I still wonder how I survived their reaction after they heard the first notes from 'She is the dark'. The guitars sounded heavy, Aaron's grunt was as phenomenal as always and the first crowd surfers made already sure that the security wouldn't have an easy night. Aaron confessed that they felt a bit stressed because they didn't play in England for 3 years, but I'm sure that after they saw the reaction of the public they didn't feel stressed any more. The next track 'The thrash of the naked limbs' came as a big surprise. It must have been many years ago since they played that track for the last time. Some of the Greeks who were with me almost fainted from excitement. Aaron growled full of anger and fell on his knees in a strange posture at some moments when he didn't sing . On 'The snow in my hand' I heard for the first time the keyboards from Yasmine, probably because Aaron's grunt woke up the guy responsible for the mix. From then on the sound was good. 'Turn loose the swans': what a hymn, what an incredible wall of sound! The headbangers had a tough job, since the tempo was so slow they really had to concentrate to move their necks at the right moment. 'The cry of mankind' followed. My Dying Bride were wise enough not to include the five minute outro of this song in their live version. After the song, the public started shouting once again. 'Crown of sympathy!' one yelled. 'Your river!' another one shouted.
"We don't play any of them songs", Aaron replied amused, "We only play the songs from the list here". 'A kiss to remember' was the next track and it took everyone in the hall back to the time of 
'Like gods of the sun'. The dream continued with 'Under your wings and into your arms', the best track from their '34,788%... complete' album. The up tempo nature of this song inspired many headbangers and crowdsurfers to test their neck muscles and surfing abilities once again. And then at once... back to reality: "We only have time for one more song", Aaron said. We all looked a bit confused, since the My Dying Bride appearance only lasted an hour. "But don't worry, we'll come back in three years or so", he added with his typical English humour. Then the aggressive 'The fever sea' created once again complete chaos and panic in the hall. And then... they left! Everyone expected at least two-three encores from them, but it seems that La2 had to close the doors at 10:00 pm. Suddenly, everyone was back at the streets without even realising what had happened... once again embittered, frustrated, disappointed and depressed I started my way back home...
- "My Dying" Kostas Panagiotou
(17/11/2000)
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