In Flames/Killswitch Engage/Dark Tranquillity/Sentenced
The Glass House
Pomona, CA
September 17, 2002
Article by Rodrigo Escandon
Photographs by Jivka Nikolova
One of the most expected tours of the year happened this past Tuesday September 17th at the sold-out Glass House in Pomona, California. For the first time ever both Sentenced and Dark Tranquillity were finally embarking on a full US tour in support of In Flames and Killswitch Engage and the wait was well worth it.
Sentenced started off the festivities with a few songs from their latest album The Cold White Light , which were Konevitsan Kirkonkellot, Cross My Heart and Hope to Die and Neverlasting. The latter two songs got a great response from the crowd and it would continue with other songs from that album like Everything is Nothing, which Ville sang it very emotionally, Brief is the Light and Excuse Me While I Kill Myself. This last song was one that I hoped they would play and apparently the rest of the crowd did too because everybody was singing along to the chorus and having a great time with it.
Down was the other album that featured more than one song and they were Noose, Sun Wont Shine and the song that got the best response of the night, Warrior of Life. I am not that big of a fan of Down so these songs really did not do much for me, I would have rather heard songs from Crimson which was criminally missing from the set list. Many fans still wanted more of the old material and chants of The Suicider could be heard from the crowd and the band obeyed the requests and cranked out the song from Frozen . The show ultimately had to end and Sentenced ended their set with Amok s classic Nepenthe.
It was a great set from the Finns that unfortunately did have a couple of snags like Miikas guitar not working for a few songs and therefore some solos were not played. I could see the faces of the rest of the members especially Sami (bass) and Vesa (drums) and they looked frustrated about it. The other thing was that I think Villes singing could have been better and at times he really looked disinterested because he would sometimes sing while showing his back to the crowd. Maybe thats just the way he presents himself on stage. However, none of this takes away from their overall performance and it was such a joy to see them finally for the first time.
Up next was the band I was looking forward most to seeing, Dark Tranquillity . With songs from most of their albums comprising the set list and with an energy level that was unmatched by the rest of the bands, Dark Tranquillity easily were the best band of the night. Right from the opening track Havens The Wonders At Your Feet the band was totally into it, urging the crowd on and Mikeal would go all over the stage giving hand-fives to the fans up front and sporting a huge smile all the time. It was extremely clear that they were all extremely happy to be playing and the crowd responded with giving an equal amount of energy. Of course, the set comprised of songs from their excellent new release Damage Done like The Treason Wall, White Noise/Black Silence, Monochramatic Stains, Hours Passed in Exile, my favorite song from this album, and closing the night with the powerful Final Resistance.
Filling the rest of their set were Haven, The Sun Fired Blanks, Zodijackyl Light and Punish My Heaven. Hearing a couple of songs from their older album was a real treat, I only wished that they had more time to play so that maybe they could have played other songs from those early classics. I was absolutely beat after they finished their highly energetic performance and fittingly like their tour shirt says in the back I sustained Serious Damage by watching them.
Next were Killswitch Engage , a band that I had no idea what they were like and I was really surprised that they were on this bill. In the end I was not too very impressed by them. They play in the metalcore style which is kind of hit and miss for me and in this case was a definite miss. They did have some positives like the vocalist who would sing cleanly during most of the choruses and showed a lot of energy, well the whole band showed a lot of energy. It is hard to really enjoy a band in a live setting when you have not heard anything by them and I think that is the main reason I did not warm up to them but there were certain songs by them that did interest me and I will be looking to hear some of their new material to make a better judgment on them.
Finally it was time for In Flames to take the stage and this would be my fourth time seeing them live. After what seemed an eternity for the stage to be set up, probably because I just could not wait to see them, the band came in wearing all white clothes and cranked it up with Bullet Ride, the song that apparently is becoming their show opener and with good reason because that got the entire crowd in a frenzy. The fun went on with Embody the Invisible and the excellent Behind Space which is absolutely awesome live every single time I hear it. It was time for the band to play a song from the much talked about new album Reroute to Remain and it was the first single Cloud Connected. All the new songs they played translated very well into the live setting and the crowd response was excellent for all of them. These songs were Trigger, Drifter, Black & White and System. With so many good songs for the band to choose to include in their set, it is hard to please everyone including me because I was looking forward to maybe hearing Reroute to Remain and Egonomic. However, this was no big deal because with such an extensive catalog there had to be time for songs like Episode 666 and Only for the Weak two of the most popular songs of the night. The other songs that comprised the set were Clad in Shadows, Gyroscope, Ordinary Story (one of my favorite songs by them), Colony, Clayman and Pinball Map. Unfortunately there was a glaring omission and that was that no songs from The Jester Race were included like Artifacts of the Black Rain and Moonshield which they have played before in previous shows I attended. Other than this negative, In Flames was excellent and everyone was at their top of the game including Anders who was battling flu symptoms.
Afterwards, I was able to hang around and talk to the guys from Dark Tranquillity . I could not see where the members of Sentenced or In Flames were, maybe I was just not looking hard enough. Anyways I had great conversations with Mikael who is in the USA for the first time ever and one of his first nights here was to see Rush in Portland. He was obviously very excited in telling that story. Niklas mentioned that a difference between the crowd tonight and back in Europe was how violent the mosh pits got here. He was kind of disappointed in the fact that here they were in the US and traveling to great cities and that unfortunately with how tight their schedule is they wont be able to do much sight seeing but that next time hopefully they will. Will this mean that Dark Tranquillity will come back to the US? All he would say and probably because there may not be any set plans was Hopefully.
This was an excellent night of metal and to be able to see two great bands for the first time ever was an absolute treat. Hopefully, the fact that the show was sold-out and that the fans were responding very positively to the music will mean that both Sentenced and Dark Tranquillity will be able to come again.
The Glass House
Pomona, CA
September 17, 2002
Article by Rodrigo Escandon
Photographs by Jivka Nikolova
One of the most expected tours of the year happened this past Tuesday September 17th at the sold-out Glass House in Pomona, California. For the first time ever both Sentenced and Dark Tranquillity were finally embarking on a full US tour in support of In Flames and Killswitch Engage and the wait was well worth it.
Sentenced started off the festivities with a few songs from their latest album The Cold White Light , which were Konevitsan Kirkonkellot, Cross My Heart and Hope to Die and Neverlasting. The latter two songs got a great response from the crowd and it would continue with other songs from that album like Everything is Nothing, which Ville sang it very emotionally, Brief is the Light and Excuse Me While I Kill Myself. This last song was one that I hoped they would play and apparently the rest of the crowd did too because everybody was singing along to the chorus and having a great time with it.
Down was the other album that featured more than one song and they were Noose, Sun Wont Shine and the song that got the best response of the night, Warrior of Life. I am not that big of a fan of Down so these songs really did not do much for me, I would have rather heard songs from Crimson which was criminally missing from the set list. Many fans still wanted more of the old material and chants of The Suicider could be heard from the crowd and the band obeyed the requests and cranked out the song from Frozen . The show ultimately had to end and Sentenced ended their set with Amok s classic Nepenthe.
It was a great set from the Finns that unfortunately did have a couple of snags like Miikas guitar not working for a few songs and therefore some solos were not played. I could see the faces of the rest of the members especially Sami (bass) and Vesa (drums) and they looked frustrated about it. The other thing was that I think Villes singing could have been better and at times he really looked disinterested because he would sometimes sing while showing his back to the crowd. Maybe thats just the way he presents himself on stage. However, none of this takes away from their overall performance and it was such a joy to see them finally for the first time.
Up next was the band I was looking forward most to seeing, Dark Tranquillity . With songs from most of their albums comprising the set list and with an energy level that was unmatched by the rest of the bands, Dark Tranquillity easily were the best band of the night. Right from the opening track Havens The Wonders At Your Feet the band was totally into it, urging the crowd on and Mikeal would go all over the stage giving hand-fives to the fans up front and sporting a huge smile all the time. It was extremely clear that they were all extremely happy to be playing and the crowd responded with giving an equal amount of energy. Of course, the set comprised of songs from their excellent new release Damage Done like The Treason Wall, White Noise/Black Silence, Monochramatic Stains, Hours Passed in Exile, my favorite song from this album, and closing the night with the powerful Final Resistance.
Filling the rest of their set were Haven, The Sun Fired Blanks, Zodijackyl Light and Punish My Heaven. Hearing a couple of songs from their older album was a real treat, I only wished that they had more time to play so that maybe they could have played other songs from those early classics. I was absolutely beat after they finished their highly energetic performance and fittingly like their tour shirt says in the back I sustained Serious Damage by watching them.
Next were Killswitch Engage , a band that I had no idea what they were like and I was really surprised that they were on this bill. In the end I was not too very impressed by them. They play in the metalcore style which is kind of hit and miss for me and in this case was a definite miss. They did have some positives like the vocalist who would sing cleanly during most of the choruses and showed a lot of energy, well the whole band showed a lot of energy. It is hard to really enjoy a band in a live setting when you have not heard anything by them and I think that is the main reason I did not warm up to them but there were certain songs by them that did interest me and I will be looking to hear some of their new material to make a better judgment on them.
Finally it was time for In Flames to take the stage and this would be my fourth time seeing them live. After what seemed an eternity for the stage to be set up, probably because I just could not wait to see them, the band came in wearing all white clothes and cranked it up with Bullet Ride, the song that apparently is becoming their show opener and with good reason because that got the entire crowd in a frenzy. The fun went on with Embody the Invisible and the excellent Behind Space which is absolutely awesome live every single time I hear it. It was time for the band to play a song from the much talked about new album Reroute to Remain and it was the first single Cloud Connected. All the new songs they played translated very well into the live setting and the crowd response was excellent for all of them. These songs were Trigger, Drifter, Black & White and System. With so many good songs for the band to choose to include in their set, it is hard to please everyone including me because I was looking forward to maybe hearing Reroute to Remain and Egonomic. However, this was no big deal because with such an extensive catalog there had to be time for songs like Episode 666 and Only for the Weak two of the most popular songs of the night. The other songs that comprised the set were Clad in Shadows, Gyroscope, Ordinary Story (one of my favorite songs by them), Colony, Clayman and Pinball Map. Unfortunately there was a glaring omission and that was that no songs from The Jester Race were included like Artifacts of the Black Rain and Moonshield which they have played before in previous shows I attended. Other than this negative, In Flames was excellent and everyone was at their top of the game including Anders who was battling flu symptoms.
Afterwards, I was able to hang around and talk to the guys from Dark Tranquillity . I could not see where the members of Sentenced or In Flames were, maybe I was just not looking hard enough. Anyways I had great conversations with Mikael who is in the USA for the first time ever and one of his first nights here was to see Rush in Portland. He was obviously very excited in telling that story. Niklas mentioned that a difference between the crowd tonight and back in Europe was how violent the mosh pits got here. He was kind of disappointed in the fact that here they were in the US and traveling to great cities and that unfortunately with how tight their schedule is they wont be able to do much sight seeing but that next time hopefully they will. Will this mean that Dark Tranquillity will come back to the US? All he would say and probably because there may not be any set plans was Hopefully.
This was an excellent night of metal and to be able to see two great bands for the first time ever was an absolute treat. Hopefully, the fact that the show was sold-out and that the fans were responding very positively to the music will mean that both Sentenced and Dark Tranquillity will be able to come again.
