Spence said

[orig][quote]

Went to this last night in Rochester, it was an incredible time.

I missed the first two bands(Sarcous, Nokturnal Hellstorm) but apparently they were super mediocre.

Orodruin were pretty cool stoner rock, with an awesome stage presence, but I was dead from the drive so I kind of zoned out during their set.

Demontage were awesome, really solid death metal with a really kickass drummer. (who, just so happened, to be blind. Fucking nuts)

Cormorant and Blood Ceremony were both really good, and sounded great, but I more or less passed out in the back during their sets. Can't really remember anything about them other than Cormorant's singer/bassist chilling with me later on, and Blood Ceremony's chick being kind of awkward on stage with her super tall high heels.

While Heaven Wept were great. Played great, sounded great, had great stage presence. But considering there was maybe two hundred people in the crowd and the fact they were an OPENER, they were way too fucking pretentious. Every band(including Primordial) didn't take longer than ten minutes to set up and soundcheck. WHW took about twenty minutes, and kept complaining until everything was perfect. And their singer was acting like he was playing in front of five thousand people, not two hundred. So awkward. The fog machine overloaded during their set though and they pretty much were completely drowned in it by the end of their set though, including one time where the singer was doing a high note and ended up coughing due to all the fog. Good ol karma.

Macabre was fun and crazy, of course. Sadly, I was only one of about five people who seemed to be enjoying them. Sad. Also, them playing a cover of that THE CAT CAME BACK, THE VERY NEXT DAY was priceless. Pretty sure that's a song my parents sang to me when I was like two years old.

Primordial were fucking incredible. They went on at like 12:15 or so, and played about twelve songs. The singer is a fucking nut, he destroyed three mic stands during their setlist as well as drank 4/5's of a bottle of rum straight over the course of their set. Their sound wasn't perfect as one guitar was way louder than the other and the bass guitar, but whatever. The drumming was also perfect and the stage presence was incredible. There was, MAYBE, sixty people in the crowd but Primordial were still way better than when they played the Palladium in front of a thousand. Also, the fog machine broke again during their set but unlike during WHW where it caused problems, it only made the show ten times more awesome by making it near-impossible to see anyone on stage. Also, by the last song, Alan wasn't even on the stage. He was just running around in the crowd singing with us.

As for the venue, the Water Tavern or whatever it was called, was pretty bitching. Sound quality was solid, atmosphere was great, the staff was laid back and the venue definitely had the vibe of being able to do both DIY 50 person shows as well as professional sold out shows. (Venue has a capacity of 1,105 apparently)

It was also funny watching all these metal bands while posters all around the venue for upcoming concerts there were listing bands like The Wombats, Coheed and Cambria, Steve Vai, Minus the Bear, The Antlers, etc. I guess not many metal shows happen there, which is a shame since it'd be perfect for pretty much any metal or punk band, ah well.

As a whole, worth the trip. Definitely.

Also, as an afterthought, all the Epica fans don't know what's going to hit them on Friday. Primordial is going to utterly rape Progpower in the ass.