LIVE REVIEW: Obituary @ The Electric Ballroom, London

Seasoned death metallers OBITUARY weren’t on the UK leg of TRIVIUM‘s recent tour; something they made up for by announcing one night at Camden’s Electric Ballroom – which promptly sold out. And so 1500 fans of extremity descended on the iconic venue to bear witness to not only that, but support from two of the UK’s hottest bands. 

“Are you ready for some fucking death metal?” CELESTIAL SANCTUARY don’t fuck about, tearing straight into a half hour of old school death metal shot through with a particularly virulent strain of hardcore. Billing themselves as the new wave of British death metal is a bold statement but with fist-pumping anthems like Soul Diminished or the seething Mass Extinction inciting pits within a few moments of starting, they more than back their claims up. At times they’re barely visible through the haze onstage but they cut through it like a filth-encrusted knife, the mix letting every festering riff hit like a sledgehammer. Give it up for death metal, indeed. 

Rating: 8/10

CONJURER, by contrast, meld their earth shattering riffs with sludge, post-metal and as many forms of extreme metal as they can grab. The resultant concoction is miserable in the best way, evoking a despair or yearning few others manage. The opening salvo of It Dwells and Choke are monolithic in stature and heaviness, offering a more cerebral take on extremity, but one that’s equally intense. The quartet are renowned as one of the UK’s finest live bands and tonight is another example in a long list of them as to exactly why that is.

Bassist Connor Marshall stakes his claim for Corpsegrinder‘s windmilling throne while vocalists Brady Deeprose and Dan Nightingale screech and bellow their way through, all the while firing off serpentine, complex guitar passages or, as is the case with Choke, dropping a barnburner of a riff sure to be the cause of more than a few sore necks tomorrow. They show their clear dominance of the room best during Hollow in which Nightingale shows off his fearsome bellow, forgoing the mic and instead roaring from the front of the stage during its first verse. They might do it often, just like Marshall‘s descent into the pit for Hadal, but frankly when it’s this good, there’s no sense in fixing what ain’t broke. 

Rating: 10/10

The excitement in the air is palpable by the time OBITUARY take to the stage. Touring this year’s dependably excellent Dying Of Everything, naturally they lean more into its material but pull enough out their back catalogue to satisfy the most “their debut was better” fan. To set the scene they drop an unexpected Snortin’ Whiskey by PAT TRAVERS BAND over the PA before the band stroll on to raucous applause. At that point it’s off to the death metal races, and the second the first frenetic verse riff kicks in, the air’s full of beer and bodies.

At this point in their career, OBITUARY aren’t exactly reinventing the wheel but they can easily hang with bands half their age, delivering death metal anthems from Sentence Day and I’m In Pain through to modern cuts like Visions In My Head or The Wrong Time with exuberant ease. It’s an enthusiasm more than matched by 1500 fans who mosh, cheer, pit and hurl themselves round the floor gleefully as the band dish out grimy hit after grimy hit. The longevity and influence they’ve had on the scene while still churning out their own dependable level of quality proves just why so many devotees made their way here and sold the show out so quick; OBITUARY might take their name from the aftermath of death, but there’s plenty of life in the old dog yet.

Rating: 9/10

Check out our photo gallery of the night’s action in London from Farrah Kathleen here: 

Like OBITUARY on Facebook.