Eminence/Darklight Corporation Guns of Dawn Tour, The Royal, Palmerston North, Fri Sep 09 2011

Another night at The Royal in Palmy with metal from local executioners Bloodworx, two Wellington bands Evil In Eden and Darklight Corporation, and an international act to boot in Brazilian, Eminence. What a way to spend the night.

Bloodworx are a local outfit that have been playing together for quite a while now. They describe themselves as technical melodic metal which does leave it fairly wide open. Their singer, Mike Smith, has a very cool growl and gets right into talking to the crowd and amping them up. A good front man interacts with the crowd and Mike does an awesome job at this. The two guitar players, Johnny Moore and Craig Monk, trade off riffs and leads like there's no tomorrow and show themselves to be very strong musicians. These guys got the crowd off to a great start and the mosh pit had plenty of action. This is one Palmy band to watch out for. Playing a set of all original material these guys showed the visitors how we do it in Palmy. The crowd roared for more at the end but time was pushing on with four bands on the bill.

Evil In Eden have a whole lot of hassles setting up their keyboard which delayed their set and in the end they gave up and got on with the set minus the keyboards. They played what I would call nu-metal, quite often doing vocal harmonies that were more reminiscent of a hard rock band than a full on thrash or death metal band. These guys reminded me in some ways of Escape The Fate. These guys rocked out and the crowd responded pretty well to them but I think a lot of people were waiting for the next two bands in the line up. Evil In Eden come from Wellington and put on a great show so if you’re in the area check them out.

Darklight Corporation has only been around for a few years but they are making a name for themselves both here and abroad and it isn’t without reason. I voted for them several years ago when they entered the competition to open up for Rock 2 Wellington and I was quite disappointed that they didn’t win the slot. I was very much looking forward to their set tonight as I had high anticipation of what their live shows would be like. They have a very solid guitar sound from Chris Prenter and their front man Fabio Santos once again steps up and shows us what a front man should be. Fabio calls the crowd forward and then growls and screams at you bringing smiles across the faces, of the quite sadistic bunch of metal heads. To me it’s quite an industrial sound with blistering guitar work and a very tight rhythm section. These guys are an awesome example of how good NZ metal is at the moment with so much talent to offer. Between Darklight and Bloodworx we were dealt some awesome hard metal.

Eminence from Brazil was a step up again. I was very impressed by this band. They have a style which is quite unique with lots of flavour. Brazilian metal, especially the drumming has a very enchanting rhythm I would best describe as tribal and there’s no better place to showcase it than metal. They came all the way from Brazil to show us how it’s done and everybody learned their lessons. They played mainly thrash and death metal in style with the tribal rhythms some of it comes across as industrial. These guys put on a mean show and didn’t leave without a head not banging in the room. They have released three albums so far and played a cross section of each during their set. One of the best things about metal is that language is no barrier and a Brazilian death growl is a thing to behold, it's accent gives it another sound altogether. There were some fans made on this night and from the response of the band I hope they come back very soon.

• 1
  Head Like A Hole
• 2
  Horror Story
• 3
  Fraser Ross
• 4
  Fur Patrol
• 5
  Michelle Rounds
• 6
  L.A.B.
• 7
  Devilskin
• 8
  Coridian
• 9
  The Boondocks
• 10
  Late to Chelsea

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• 1
  APT.
  ROSÉ And Bruno Mars
• 2
  DIE WITH A SMILE
  Lady Gaga And Bruno Mars
• 3
  BIRDS OF A FEATHER
  Billie Eilish
• 4
  TASTE
  Sabrina Carpenter
• 5
  I LOVE YOU, I'M SORRY
  Gracie Abrams
• 6
  ESPRESSO
  Sabrina Carpenter
• 7
  SAILOR SONG
  Gigi Perez
• 8
  LOSE CONTROL
  Teddy Swims
• 9
  A BAR SONG (TIPSY)
  Shaboozey
• 10
  GOOD LUCK, BABE!
  Chappell Roan

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