LIVE REVIEW: Insomnium @ O2 Academy Islington, London
What better way to herald the shortening of days and the arrival of autumn than with the melancholic majesty of Finland’s INSOMNIUM? Only in the UK for two nights, they’ve made sure to load up on miserablism, touring both this year’s Anno 1696 concept album and subsequent EP Songs Of The Dusk.
Black metallers KVAEN open the evening, rampaging through frosty guitar and a near constant onslaught of double kick drumming. There’s a flair for the dramatic too, with trad metal solos and galloping riffs, one that goes down exceptionally well with the already packed crowd. It’s their first ever time in the UK which goes some way to explaining the healthy turnout for them. Sadly it’s all a little too melodic black metal by numbers and there’s not much staying power in their songs.
Rating: 7/10
Sonically skewing a little closer to tonight’s headliners, IN MOURNING are an evocative mix of melodic death metal with progressive elements, with off kilter time signatures that flow into blastbeats like opener Thornwalker. Unfortunately for them, the mix isn’t as clear as before and they suffer for it. Despite this, the towering melodies still stand tall, and the heavier passages are bludgeoning without being overly murky. As you’d expect from prog, they play just a handful songs in a set spanning a full 45 minutes, but to their credit it’s less meandering and more exploratory, each sonic segue an interesting development that pushes somewhere new before returning.
Rating: 8/10
“Show me the horns,” bassist Niilo Sevänen grins as INSOMNIUM stride on to loud cheers and launch into a one-two opening combo of 1696 and the anthemic Ephemeral. The latter goes down a storm, and the crowd finally starts moving as its huge chorus kicks in. Continuing with the Anno 1696 material, White Christ offers a doomier pace, but it’s no less hook-laden. It’s certainly been a while since INSOMNIUM last came to these shores on a headline tour, and it means the room is heaving for them, and offers rapturous applause for old and new material alike.
They even reach back to 2004’s Since The Day It All Came Down for its title track that draws some of the loudest cheers of the night. That’s saying something too, as the crowd get stuck in with whatever’s asked of them, from fist pumping, chants of “hey” or the whole room clapping during the build of Pale Morning Star. For a band whose stock in trade has been morose melodeath for two decades, you’d be forgiven for thinking they don’t bring energy; the barrelling Only One Who Waits swiftly dispels that notion, as do the roiling crowd who are clearly loving it. The band more than make up for their absence with a sprawling 90 minute set covering twenty years of INSOMNIUM and as many fan favourites as they can cram in alongside the new material. Hopefully it won’t be as long until next time.
Rating: 9/10
Check out our photo gallery of the night’s action in London from Karolina Janikunaite here:
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