Some of you may know that my friends and I (Justin, who posts here as mosquito, and Adam, who posts occasionally as Chai) were on the rail for every single band last year. I did it for the pre-show as well, with Accept. It hurt the legs and feet, but ultimately it was worth it because I got to see and mentally rank the performances in my head. I never got around to truly reviewing the show in depth, but suffice to say I had a great time rocking out to just about every set and then talking about them with everybody.
Here's why this year rules:
Unlike last year, I there are no bands I don't want to see.
I'm not the biggest fan of femme-metal...I'm picky. Suffice to say I'm not a Leaves' Eyes or Delain fan, and they were two of my least favorite sets of last year. I pretty much had to 'sit through' them waiting on subsequent more desirable bands. This year doesn't look like that to me.
I made the wise decision of buying the Creations End and Haken CDs during the insider sale. Haken = love, Creations End = like, but I see where it could be awesome, need to give it more time.
Ian (Dolamite S. Biffle) will tell you how excited for Arcturus I am. I kissed him. he liked it.
While Heaven Wept, Therion, Sanctuary, Voyager, Dream Evil, Labyrinth, Evergrey, and Vanden Plas are all going to be fucking amazing. I've seen a select few of those bands before to good results, and the rest are bands I've wanted to see for some time.
Red Circuit has a vocalist I'm familiar with and very much like, and only two albums. And Mob Rules and Eldritch both have material that I'm somewhat familiar with, but a few filler albums that they might play some stuff from that I don't know. However, I don't expect to have to "sit through" either performance.
If you skip everything and only read this paragraph, suffice to say, I think that this lineup has me more excited than any other in the past in a way that makes me truly excited to punish my legs, knees, and feet once again in an effort to hear every note, see every moment, and experience every performance start-to-finish. And maybe even buy some merch if the dudes at the front will continue to save my spot.
Wall of text over.
Here's why this year rules:
Unlike last year, I there are no bands I don't want to see.
I'm not the biggest fan of femme-metal...I'm picky. Suffice to say I'm not a Leaves' Eyes or Delain fan, and they were two of my least favorite sets of last year. I pretty much had to 'sit through' them waiting on subsequent more desirable bands. This year doesn't look like that to me.
I made the wise decision of buying the Creations End and Haken CDs during the insider sale. Haken = love, Creations End = like, but I see where it could be awesome, need to give it more time.
Ian (Dolamite S. Biffle) will tell you how excited for Arcturus I am. I kissed him. he liked it.
While Heaven Wept, Therion, Sanctuary, Voyager, Dream Evil, Labyrinth, Evergrey, and Vanden Plas are all going to be fucking amazing. I've seen a select few of those bands before to good results, and the rest are bands I've wanted to see for some time.
Red Circuit has a vocalist I'm familiar with and very much like, and only two albums. And Mob Rules and Eldritch both have material that I'm somewhat familiar with, but a few filler albums that they might play some stuff from that I don't know. However, I don't expect to have to "sit through" either performance.
If you skip everything and only read this paragraph, suffice to say, I think that this lineup has me more excited than any other in the past in a way that makes me truly excited to punish my legs, knees, and feet once again in an effort to hear every note, see every moment, and experience every performance start-to-finish. And maybe even buy some merch if the dudes at the front will continue to save my spot.
Wall of text over.
