Elvenking - Raunchy - Protest The Hero - Firewind - Haggard - The Sorrow - Amon Amarth - Vreid - Amorphis - Cynic - Life Of Agony - Urgehal - Sabaton - Koldbrann - Schandmaul - Obscura - Entombed - Black Messiah - The Haunted - Skyforger - Psychopunch - Sacred Steel - The Other - Nim Vind - Callejon - Battlelore - The Cumshots - The New Black - Unsun

Like a couple of other bands on this year’s SUMMER BREEZE billing, I haven’t yet heard that much of :: SKYFORGER ::. The friendly but shy Latvians had their best moments, when chief growler Peter improved the rough Pagan Metal with his dirty-brutal voice. The purely traditional Black Metal section in the band with guitars, bass, drums and vocals was the part, which becomes SKYFORGER (at least here on the SUMMER BREEZE) best. For as soon as Kaspars, who is responsible for the clean voice and the traditional instruments, set in, it sounded somehow off-key – which kind of affected the whole performance. Nevertheless, the heathen metallers convinced with dedicated stage acting, even though they definitely have to improve their communication with the crowd. Well, I have to leave pretty fast to get to the Main Stage before a Swedish killer commando starts out to perform another festival highlight.

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I have to admit that I haven’t tracked :: THE HAUNTED :: so intensely after the re-entry of Peter Dolving – but I still I was so curious, the more so as I had read Torsten’s live review of the gig of the Swedes in February this year before the SUMMER BREEZE.
And what a bang! 50 minutes right into your face! The setlist was a potpourri of all the stages of the band history, whereas I liked most In Vein off the debut and the mighty triumvirate Dark Intentions, Bury Your Dead and Trespass off the exquisite second album The Haunted Made Me Do It as well as Trenches (Peter announced the track as “Metalcore”-song) and 99.
The hyperactive front man Peter sprinted across the stage as if stung by an adder, posed like a young god and had both the brutal and the clean parts down pat – this shows once again that he ain’t just the crazy vocalist of THE HAUNTED but also has plenty of grey matter vocal wise. It is self-evident that the crowd enjoyed such a show. The communication with the fans was great and peaked as Peter went off stage and dared into the crowd. Incredible, he waded through the fans who just were strung together so closely that no paper sheet would have fit between them. And everyone stepped aside respectfully. Moses must have felt this way when he let the sea split before him… Literally a sight for the gods! And why that? Dolving wanted to see a wall of death and didn’t want to linger, but staged it himself just like a director who shows his protagonists what to do.
I don’t want to create the impression with this review that THE HAUNTED consists of a singer only. The Björler-brothers Anders and Jonas on guitar and bass as well as Jensen and Per on guitar and drums were also visibly motivated and completed the perfect picture of this top 3 gig of the whole festival. Thank you very much!
Setlist: Little Cage, The Drowning, Trespass, The Flood, The Medication, Moronic Colossus, D.O.A., In Vein, Trenches, 99, Dark Intentions, Bury Your Dead

:: ENTOMBED :: had their gig after this hurricane named The Haunted on the Pain Stage. A bold venture. As the first tunes of the pretty cool intro Satan Is Real of the country bards The Louvin Brothers sounded it was clear that the Swedes once again should show the kids out there how Swedish old school Death Metal has to sound like…
And so the guys around Lasse Petrov began an energetic gig, which totally ignored the first two records. That does not mean that songs like Wolverine Blues, Demon, Damn Deal Done or When In Sodom aren’t so brilliant to easily play (almost) every other Death Metal band on this festival to the ground. Anyhow, just out of nostalgia I wished to hear the one or the other song of the early nineties. But let’s get back to the gig…
Lasse surprised with an impressive knowledge of German right after the opener Serpent Saints (“Alles gut, meine Damen und Headbanger? Sind keine Damen hier? Ah, da sind ja zwei – immerhin!”) and it was a pleasure watching him gesturing wildly and making the coolest grimaces while doing his job. The sound was mixed really good and transparent and the exasperating matter with the missing second guitar gets more irrelevant from gig to gig as Alex and the session bassist (who helps out the band as Nico became father – congrats on our part!) complemented each other fantastically and filled each break in the sound, which worked as well as with their fellow countrymen Grand Magus.
Setlist: Serpent Saints, Eye For An Eye, When In Sodom, In The Blood, Eyemaster, Damn Deal Done, Like This With The Devil, Chief Rebel Angel, Demon, Wolverine Blues, Out Of Hand, Masters Of Death

Black Metal has completely been banished from the two main stages this year. All Black Metal bands were degraded to the party stage whereas last year bands like Endstille, Marduk, Primordial or Keep Of Kalessin and the year before Necrophobic, Secrets Of The Moon and the very KOLDBRANN :: could fire up the crowd on the main stages. It’s a pity since this great gig of the Norwegians should have been open to a bigger crowd, even though the party tent was filled quite well. Vocalist Mannevond was surprisingly good-humored and fired up the crowd to burn out themselves. And thus the crowd celebrated KOLDBRANN’s mainly midtempo Black Metal. The five Black Metal heads proved to have sense for humour as they intoned a short cover of the main theme of “Derrick” – a 70ies till 90ies German crime series – very cool! Btw. what do you think of this: Mannevond as new vocalist of Endstille? Wouldn’t that be great?

So, I could easily see the :: URGEHAL :: gig – no risk to miss the Amorphis gig. The second, by far more aggressive Black Metal band today snatched off a pretty good gig. The four Norsemen (incl. Mannevond as bassist) went about it faster and gruffer than their fellow countrymen Koldbrann. The eccentric guitar player Enzifer and bassist Mannevond got out of line in URGEHAL. The first one because of his extremely bizarre-morbid outfit, who could pass off as a young Pinhead with his “studded crown”. And the last mentioned because of his cool rock star poses. Once more one can note during the gigs of the two Black Metal bands how well the sound is mixed in the party tent this year. Hence URGEHAL’s gig was impressive in every aspect.

Before attending the Cynic gig in the party tent, I dared to get a longer glimpse at the main stage, where the Hardcore Metal Crossover pioneers :: LIFE OF AGONY :: were about to kick some asses. And how they did it… The New York-based band that reunited 2003 acts best with Keith Caputo as singer, that’s what the meanwhile longhaired, a bit spacy appearing neo hippie proved once again. The band was motivated to the core, guitar player Joey Z. and bass player Allan burnt more calories during this gig than I do in one year, ex-Type O Negative drummer Sal set the foundation for a set list, which could confidently be considered as a best of of the band history. Keith indeed had some problems with the very high passages e.g. in This Time, ably sailed round them by slightly changing the vocal lines. That’s the way a capable, a bit grown old singer has to act when he doesn’t want to make a fool of himself. Great gig!
Setlist: River Runs Red, This Time, Method Of Groove, Love To Let You Down, Other Side Of The River, Weeds, Lost At 22, My Eyes, Bad Seed, Justified, Through And Through, Underground

I had to say goodbye to Life Of Agony to be able to see the technical Jazz Metal heads of :: CYNIC ::. But actually that was worth it considering what Paul Masvidal, Sean Reinert, Robin Zielhorst and Tymon Kruidenier had to offer the fans in the party tent. I already had the honor to see CYNIC as opener for Opeth on their last tour in Munich. They appeared a bit restrained and heavy-legged back then. Nothing compared to the energetic gig today in the party tent. Meanwhile I got used to the comeback album Traced In Air and it grows more and more on me. All the more I could enjoy killer songs such as Evolutionary Sleeper, The Space For This or Veil Of Maya off the debut Focus by a good-humored and pretty agile band, before I have to leave a bit earlier not to miss one song of Finland’s export article nr. 1, Amorphis.
Setlist: Nunc Fluens, The Space For This, Evolutionary Sleeper, Celestial Voyage, Veil Of Maya, Adam’s Murmur, King Of Those Who Know, Integral Birth, How Could I

I have read much about the live qualities of the Swedish sextet. Finally I could receive an impression of that – and the SUMMER BREEZE 2009 seemed to be a good possibility. Well, and :: AMORPHIS :: did a really, really god job. No matter whether it’s the choice of songs, which unfortunately excluded classics such as Black Winter Day or The Way but still had enough space for not less important songs considering the high frequency of hits in their career – among them some songs, many fans haven’t reckoned like Magic And Mayhem off the Tales From The Thousand Lakes album or a completely revised version of My Kantele off the Elegy album. And it was impressive how well rehearsed the Finns are. Tomi as conductor of the masses swaggered across the stage, moshed (whereas his dreads could already be passed for a weapon) and growled and sang similarly like Dolving of The Haunted. It’s simply a pleasure, how AMORPHIS make it on stage, to convey a rock song with balladic elements far from any clichés like From The Heaven Of My Heart on stage so emotionally intense. The Finns are invincible in this line-up.
Setlist: Towards And Against, From The Heaven Of My Heart, Against Widows, The Castaway, Sampo, Silver Bride, Alone, The Smoke, My Kantele, House Of Sleep, Magic And Mayhem

Today was closed for me by a great gig of :: AMON AMARTH ::– I didn’t really expect anything else of these likeable Swedes. Compared to the show two years ago, the band abandoned an extravagant stage set and left the ship’s bow with the dragonhead in the suitcase. Nevertheless, there were enough pyros, a pretty sumptuous stage light and a lot of podiums and the like were installed, so that the guys could present themselves in their coolest poses or just simultaneously propeller headbang. The choice of songs was way better than 2007, personally for a simple reason: I haven’t really been interested in AMON AMARTH before the release of Twilight Of The Thunder God 2008. That doesn’t mean that I dislike the older material, but to my sense the songs missed the necessary clout and melodies and harmonies with a long-term effect, with witch it swarms on the new album.
All hell was let loose in front of the stage. There have been more fans than during the headliner gig of Opeth on Saturday. A killer gig with killer songs such as the title track of the new album, Guardians Of Asgaard (unfortunately Entombed had to leave earlier; that’s why we had to abandon the much longed guest appearance of Lars Göran Petrov), Free Will Sacrifice or the ingenious Thousand Years Of Oppression and the obligatory bouncer Death In Fire. A worthy headliner. Thanx a lot!
Setlist: Twilight Of The Thunder God, Free Will Sacrifice, Asator, Varyags Of Miklagaard, Runes To My Memory, Guardians Of Asgaard, Live For The Kill, Fate Of Norns, Victorious March, Pursuit Of Vikings // Cry Of The Blackbirds, Death In Fire

story & pics © Haris