02.06.2004
all fotos © by Matthew Haumschild
The public use of these fotos is strictly prohibited without written permission.
Just the name baffles
me. From Alaska, you don’t see very many acts except Jewel come out of
Alaska, a metal act to boot! If I were to describe their sound, I would
classify them as Modern Rock meets Hardcore. I say this, mainly for the
singing style. The singer would go into vocal patterns reminiscent of
System of a Down then sound like the singer from Earth Crisis. In the
begging of a few of their songs, they did have nice guitar intro’s with
some cool effects. Frankly, I wish more guitar players did that and not so
much just some feedback effect. To be honest, this band wasn’t good
enough to write home about let alone write a review of them. The music
wasn’t that original, they had a few good riffs here and there but
that’s it. Nothing that really grabbed my attention. Some of the fans
liked them, but I have seen better local bands.
I still remember the
first time I saw these guys, it was in 2000 when they opened up from Opeth
and Nevermore in Arizona. They even played before Angel Dust! Even then, I
knew these guys were going somewhere. Look at them now, co-headlining with
Machine Head, playing on the jägermeister tour, playing a few Ozzfest
dates, new record that is doing well with a video that’s on MTV from
time to time as well as Much Music’s Uranium. I just knew it. God Forbid
came on stage and just with the first song, put 36 Crazy Fists to shame.
It wasn’t even funny, they came on with some new material and the floor
was just going at it. God Forbid has, in my opinion, one of the best
drummers touring. In fact, I’ll go as far as one of the greatest
drummers of all time. The drummer was like a prying mantis! He played so
fast, so many different beats, shit, that I haven't seen anyone do
with a snare drum!
During sound check,
I noticed that he had a different sound per kick drum. What that means is
that one kick drum would have just the bass sound the other kick drum
would have a click to it. My God, he would play one rhythm with one kick
and play something totally different on the other. I have no other words
to speak about this. He’s a God of drumming up there with Igor Cavalera
of Sepultura and Mike Portnoy of Dream Theater. The rest of the band was
great too. they had a pit going on and off. I also noticed, for you guitar
players, that the guitar cabinet they were using were flat and not angled.
This is also highly unusual for a metal band. They were also using a
guitar cabinet I had never heard of, but they were using Peavey 5150 heads
which makes all the difference anyway. God Forbid, over all was awesome. 
They
played a nice mixture of old stuff but they mainly played new stuff of
which I am not familiar with. Go see them , they are well worth it.
The band I came to
see. This is another band of which I hadn’t seen since I lived in
Arizona. I saw these guys when they toured there “Burning Red” album.
I also saw these guys @ Ozzfest 97’ (the greatest show ever) and with
Pantera and Coal Chamber in 98’. The band opened up with “Imperium”
from there latest release. Including myself, the whole place erupted at
the intro of the song. Then after Robb Flynn yells “Hear me now!” The
entire place, including the balcony, went nuts! I would say a good
majority of the crowd knew the words. The crowd below me went into a
large frenzy. There weren't a lot of people at this show, which was
disappointing, but the ones who did show, where the hardcore fanatics like
myself and everyone got into everything they did. With just that opening
song, in my eyes, put themselves back in the upper echelon of metal
royalty.
After
that they played “Take my Scars” and of course, this is a Machine Head
classic and for sure now, everyone was singing along. Another interesting
part of the show was when they played “Burning Red” because
it’s such a long and slow song. they pulled it off well though same with
Descend the Shade of Night. Even though they played them well, I thought
it dragged a little bit. Before I tell you what happened during “Blood
For Blood”, I have to mention to you this: Minneapolis specifically is
known for large and very violent “circle pits”. Whenever Biohazard
comes through town, they want to see it. And a few other bands in the past
have wanted to see just this like Sepultura, Fear Factory and Slayer have
also commented about the “Minneapolis Circle Pit”. Machine Head now
wanted to see it, so during the middle of “ Blood For Blood” Robb
(singer) demanded to see it, and that’s what he got! There bust have
been 300 people in this circle pit jamming along to this song. You would
have had to have been there to see it words can not describe this.
Robb
Flynn had mentioned that the next night they had off so they were going to
get all fucked up, so one of the guitar roadies made a mix drink with I
guess a ton of alcohol and gave it to Robb, he drank some of it, and
Robb was like “God damn!” and some nut in the front row started to
chant “Chug, Chug, Chug, Chug,”and to my surprise, the whole place
started to chant this and of course Robb drank the whole thing.
Then...he pointed at the person who started it and got him on stage and
made him do the same! It was great. After “Descend” Robb had mentioned
that since they had the day off tomorrow, that we were all in for a treat
because they all wanted to have a good time, they asked the crowd to pick
out a cover song. He would name the band and the album and we would
scream. 1. Black Sabbath “Paranoid”, 2. Iron Maiden “Number Of The
Beast”, or 3. Metallica “Ride The Lighting”. The crowd opted for
Metallica, then Machine Head went into “CREEPING DEATH”! It was down
tuned by at least two steps, that song didn’t exactly sound right, the
noted were just too low. He sounded great singing it , the drums were on,
and Phil Demmil performed the solo to spec. Awesome show.
setlist
1.
Imperium
2. Take my Scars
3. Blood, Sweat, Tears
4. None But My Own
5. Left Unfinished
6. Ten Ton Hammer
7. Trephination
8. Burning Red
9. In The Presence Of My Enemies
10. Blood For Blood
11. Descend The Shades Of night
12. Creeping Death
13. Davidian
14. Block
I can’t say anymore, words cannot describe how well Machine Head played that night, the words above is just scratching the surface.
36 Crazy Fists 5/10
God Forbid 8/10
Machine Head 10/10
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