OPETH playing in Muenster? Wohoo! My hometown doesn’t want to become the next metal metropolis in NRW? Hehe… Well, seriously… First the Vainstream Festival team shops bands such as Dimmu Borgir, Dark Tranquillity and Suicidal Tendencies for this year’s edition and besides OPETH also bands like Killswitch Engage play Muenster too. All I can say: GO ON with that! Really!

Of course the OPETH show is a must for very fan of progressive Death Metal. Especially since the headlining show two days ago at Rock Hard Festival was just a tired copy of what the Swedes are able to deliver (jetlag from coming over from the States).
Only the venue was quite strange. I have to confess that I never before was visiting the Skater’s Palace, and I live in Muenster for a very long time now. Well, there was no reason so far. I don’t skate and the bands playing there mostly come from the skater scene or are these terrible Emocore bands.

However, passably rested and relaxed after three days of Rock Hard Festival I once again picked up my dear friend Wiebke from the central station and together we drove to the skater’s stronghold. Of course not without a bit of… let’s call it chaos ;) Me silly one pretended to be an I-know-where-you-have-to go-to-girl misleading a Muenster-based woman into the wrong direction, totally wrong to be exactly. Sorry for that…
Ok, back to the palace… quite many people already wait in front of the locked area, it’s a sunny day, a relaxed evening and then the doors open. First we check out the interior, stage, photopit… you know. It’s just a skater hall. The biggest pipe is the stage, steel columns in the middle and the rest is draped with black curtains. No, I don’t like this venue. We try to go out again, try… and go back inside, since the tiny place outside is already overcrowded. Never mind! We get out well-deserved Becks inside! So.

:: pics ::

The evening gets started with Muenster’s finest :: LONG DISTANCE CALLING :: Having just released their sophomore, Avoid The Light made to the pole position on NH (album of the month). And this album is truly a masterpiece. I was really curious how they would present it live. With much atmosphere… in totally darkness *grrrrr* Sometime later finally the light engineer has found its knobs and there was light. Glistening spots in red, blue and purple. Well, at least there was something visible on stage now. Sound is great and the around 200 fans are much enthused by the bands music. Every of the four songs get responded by enormous applause, even an encore gets demanded, but no chance. Apparitions closes the 30 minutes performance. AWESOME. I only have seen LONG DISTANCE CALLING one time, long time ago at the release party of the debut album. And this was already a great show. Tonight’s show was just grandiose, of course way too short, especially since were taking photos during three of the four songs, which wasn’t an easy task. I want more of this, much more!
Oh, by the way… it seems like that Flo and Janosch are still members of Misery Speaks. I could have bet that they left coz of time conflicts with both bands… I was wrong.
Setlist: Sundown Highway, Black Paper Planes, Metulsky Curse Revisited, Apparitions

Out for a beer and talks with friends and back again with a short stop at the merch, saying hello to Erin (the known merch girl, home on every tour with Scandinavian bands). Full of expectations everybody stares to the stage, while Wiebke and I imploringly hope (pray? *g*) for better lights. Finally :: OPETH :: enter the stage and kick off with Heir Apparent, as they did two days ago. The Swedes look great, well-rested and in best mood, having had a day off after Rock Hard and Wave Gotik Treffen. After every song Mikael Åkerfeldt like to regale the crowd with anecdotes, tells us about strange situations when visiting a church in Muenster’s city, where people seemingly compared him with Jesus. Just to make clear 3 seconds later: “we are not a Christian band!” *laughter* Also when it comes to mimic, Mikael did his best, was covertly waving his hand to all the people taking photos of him, just to flip them the bird a second later (as a joke of course). Or he told how some songs got written: “with chips & and fish on the beach… being drunk”. Hehehe. And of course drummer Martin Axenrot got his just deserts again ;) Damn… you cannot keep all these sayings mind! It was utmost funny anyway. Fans (around 500 now) freak out and acknowledge them with frenetically applause (and sometimes heckle them stupidly). AMAZING!
OPETH play a 2 hrs show with songs from current album Watershed, always one from the latest ones and two classics from Morningrise and My Arms, Your Hearse. This times no song from Blackwater Park. Just grandiose, fantastic, breathtaking, stunning, outstanding, captivating, mesmerizing, wonderful, unique… you know.
Setlist: Intro, Heir Apparent, Ghost Of Perdition, Godhead´s Lament, Wreath, Karma, Hessian Peel, Closure, The Night And The Silent Water, Lotus Eater II Deliverance

What a great show, what a great evening, both bands included of course. Time passed by too quickly *sighs* The venue emptied out fast. Who stayed got swept little later. At least LDC guitar player Flo got the chance to celebrate his birthday right after midnight. I and Wiebke went home too. We wanted to sleep long and in the afternoon we wanted to visit the Solace store, Muenster’s brand Metal new CD store :)
I need to save some money *sighs* Also LONG DISTANCE CALLING had some great merch, really great shirts and zipper.
As for the Skater’s Palace: I’m not sure how good or bad the PA is at Sputnikhall, but I think that would have been the better place for this show. Anyway, Muenster is still in need for respectable medium-sized live club.

story & pics © Dajana