ROCK HARD FESTIVAL 2015 – A Road Trip To Hell & Back

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Black Metal, Black Star Riders, Bobby Liebling, Bolt Thrower, Cronos, Death Metal, Deserted Fear, Entombed, Flash Point, Garage Rock, Kingdom Of Worms, Last Days Here, Motorjesus, My Empire, Obituary, Overkill, Pentagram, Queen Of Spades Photography, Rock Hard Festival 2015, Rock'n'Roll, Shake Electric, Space Rock, Spiders, The Boys Are Back In Town, The Order Of Israfel, Thin Lizzy, Venom

– Friday –

After pretty much THE WORST road trip of my entire life from the deep southern region of Germany to the Ruhrarea in the middle of the middle, I finally arrived at the sunny sight that will be my home base for the next few days. As I’m currently now living anywhere near the city of Gelsenkirchen, for once I’m actually forced to live through a campout among a dozen of eager young and middle-aged metalheats who might consider this the ideal vacation – while I’m taking this as an inevitable necessity. To regain at least a little strength I got my things unpacked quickly and tried to relax – being a person who likes it rather quite and secluded, this kind of surrounding clearly won’t do the trick.

A good view onto the stage from any angle

And while the sun was hardly setting yet, God Dethroned present their blent of blast-infected Death Metal, which would work so much better in a small club with little to no light…talking about that kind of location, today’s co-headliner would feel right at home in such a surrounding. Mainly because booze and drugs are easily available, I guess. They started off in the mid 80s with their eponymous debut “Pentagram”, but never really made it back then. Some 30 years later, specially young fans of the Doom genre seem to hail this band which has rising from its own grave in the new millennium. Some part of this newly found stardom is due to the notorious documentary “Last Days Here”, that portraits Bobby Liebling in the midst of fighting his severe drug addiction…But who am I to complain, Pentagram even released a new album and took The Order Of Israfel on tour as their support.

Setlist Pentagram

1. Sign Of The Wolf
2. Forever My Queen
3. The Ghoul
4. Review Your Choices
5. Starlady
6. Ask No More
7. When The Screams Come
8. All Your Sins
9. Dying World
11. Petrified/ Relentless
12. Be Forwarned
13. Last Days Here

Caught in a mosh during the Overkill show

Yet another band that lives off its own reputation and for naming a complete genre – and YES, Black Metal therefore owes a lot to these veterans – comes from the far north of the British isles. Venom have been around pretty much forever now and its seems there’s no end to their fame, generation after generation. Unfortunately mastermind Cronos looks like a  weirdly aged version of himself nowadays (specially that red tank top does not suit him too well….).

Setlist Venom

1. Rise
2. Hammerhead
3. Bloodlust/ Black Flame (Of Satan)/ Bloodlust/ Die Hard
4. Long Haired Punks
5. Buried Alive
6. The Evil One
7. Welcome To Hell
8. Antichrist
9. Countess Bathory
10. Flight Of Hydra
11. Death Of Rock’n’Roll
12. Grinding Teeth
13. Pedal To The Metal
14. Warhead
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15. Black Metal
16. In League With Satan
17. Witching Hour

The Boys Are Back In Town

– Saturday –

Kicking off day two with some good Old School Death Metal in the vein of Entombed, Bolt Thrower or Obituary is a save way to get people awake and cure even the worst hangover instantly. Deserted Fear are not only a fan favourite, but also a band that earned some praiseful words from Rock Hard magazine itself for their 2012 debut “My Empire” saying “…simply amazing how the whole albums offers it´s permanent hit potential. If it´s allowed to say so within the death metal world. Great start!” With their sophomore attempt “Kingdom of Worms” (2014), Deserted Fear are set to tear the place apart in a most brutal and joyful manner.

Setlist Deserted Fear

1. Forging Delusions
2. Battalion Of Insanities
3. Kingdom Of Worms
4. Nocturnal Frags
5. Wrath On Your Wound
6. Field Of Death
7. Mortal Reign
8. Bury Your Dead

Three years ago, another German band was opening the second festival day and to call them a “crowd pleaser” would be the understatement of the decade: Motorjesus have been enlisted by an independent voting, started by their fan club and delivered to the festival organisers and how could they ever say no to this much dedication?! It was the right choice and re-inviting them was a great decision. During all those years I’ve been at Rock Hard Festival, I can’t remember any saturday morning being so well-attended than the one in 2012. And today it seems like everyone just waited three years for the band to return to play a set of honest and handmade Rock’n’Roll. Way to go, guys!

Setlist Motorjesus

1. Motor Discipline
2. Trouble In Motorcity
3. Speed Of The Beast
4. Fuel The Warmachine
5. Fist Of The Dragon
6. King Of The Dead End Road
7. Return Of The Demons
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8. A New War

Swedish Space Rock in broad daylight: Spiders

– Sunday –

After missing the final opening act of the festival, I can’t wait to see Spiders again! With their positive energy and space Garage Rock these sweet Swedes are not only easy on the eyes. Catchy riffs and sing-along lyrics garnished with their stage appearance, mainly Ann-Sophie’s acting in those VERY TIGHT PANTS is simply irresistable – and I’m saying this as a woman. Equipped with their latest record “Shake Electric” (2014) as well as the previous release “Flash Point” (2012), Spiders got me rocking and dancing all through their set, making them my personal highlight of Rock Hard Festival 2015. TAKK ALLA!!!

Setlist Spiders

1. Hang Man
2. High Society
3. Mad Dog
4. Control
5. Hard Times
6. Only Your Skin
7. Give Up The Fight
8. Rules Of The Game
9. Shake Electric
10. Fraction
11. War Of The World

All pictures courtesy of Queen Of Spades Photography

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THE ORDER OF ISRAFEL – Wisdom

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Adelaide, Australia, Born For War, Church of Misery, Debut Album, European Tour, Feierwerk Munich, Gothenburg, Hans Lilja, Horisont, Japan, Lonely Kamel, Morning Sun, Morning Sun (Satanas), Napalm Records, Norway, On Black Wings A Demon, Oslo, Patrik Andersson Winberg, Promises Made To The Earth, Staffan Björck, Sweden, Sweden Rock Festival, The Earth Will Deliver What Heaven Desires, The Noctuus, The Order, The Order Of Israfel, The Vow, Tom Sutton, Wisdom

From the very first few notes, that fall down soft as raindrops introducing the epic opener and title track of their debut, THE ORDER OF ISRAFEL totally caught me. As the softness vanished to give way to their heavy, slow and massive riffage, the foursome takes no prisoners. They just play Doom at its best!

If you expect this first effort to be repetitive, monotonous or sounding like so many other bands, you couldn’t be further from the truth – from the uptempo second track ‘On Black Wings, A Demon’, the fierce yet sluggish hypnotic hymn ‘The Noctuus’ to the promising invocation and final song ‘Morning Sun (Satanas)’, “Wisdom” contains an incredible variety and versatility of sound. Some to bang your head to, some to kneel down hailing the Lord Almighty – guess Tony Iommi will take this place for all disciple of Doom – and some to just have a good time rocking. Fronter Tom Sutton (best known for his previous activity in Japanese Doomsters CHURCH OF MISERY and his current Classic Hard Rock outlet, Swedish Rockers HORISONT) does not only contribute his six-string skills, but also proves to be one hell of a vocalist.

Apart from the four chapters of “Wisdom” one can enjoy both on Vinyl and CD, THE ORDER OF ISRAFEL is a pure live experience! So do yourself a favour and convince yourself that Napalm Records made the damn right choice by offering these guys a deal!

Tracklist:

Chapter I

Wisdom

On Black Wings, A Demon

Chapter II

The Noctuus

The Earth Will Deliver What Heaven Desires

Chapter III

The Order (Bonus Song)

Born Far War

Promise Made To The Earth

Chapter IV

The Vow

Morning Sun (Satanas)

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Cover by Henk Jacobson – Art of Henk

THE ORDER OF ISRAFEL – All Of A Sutton

Tags

Adelaide, Australia, Church of Misery, Debut Album, Doomdogs, European Tour, Feierwerk Munich, For Those Which Are Asleep, Freak Valley Festival, Gothenburg, Hammer Of Doom, Hans Lilja, Horisont, Japan, Lonely Kamel, Morning Sun, Napalm Records, Norway, Oslo, Patrik Andersson Winberg, Pentagram, Staffan Björck, Sweden, Sweden Rock Festival, The Order Of Israfel, The Skull, Tom Sutton, Uncle Acid And The Deadbeats, Wisdom

According to the Neon Genesis Evangelion Wiki, The seventh Angel, Israfel (イスラフェル Isuraferu), has the appearance of a massive, humanoid creature (…). Israfel has a face/mask, (…) which resembles a yin-yang symbol, and has a pair of razor sharp claws and can shoot an energy beam. It has two cores located in its chest, matched on either side of its center torso by four external bone-like rib structures. How much of this is part of the bands’ name, THE ORDER OF ISRAFEL?

Tom: I have now heard about that character, but I didn’t know about it when I came up with the name of the band. Israfel was actually mentioned to me by a friend once as the angel of music, and that idea really captured my imagination. Music is such a positive thing, and acts almost like an angel in our lives. It seemed perfect as a symbol for a group of people who really live for music. Once I looked into it a little further, I found out that the name was used in an Edgar Allen Poe poem, and is one of the four Islamic arch angels.

Shiny Happy People – Staffan, Tom, Hans & Patrik

Althoug some of the how, when and where you got together is published on the Metal Archives, would any of you like to recap the early stages of the four of you ending up forming a band?

Tom: The concept of the band has been around for about 10 years. I recorded the first songs I wrote for this band 10 years ago. Once I joined CHURCH OF MISERY, I felt like I didn’t have time to look for members or anything, but I knew I’d do it one day. When I worked for PENTAGRAM as a guitar tech, Patrik’s old band, DOOMDOGS played a few shows with them, and that’s how I met Patrik. When I decided to move to Gothenburg, he put his hand up and said he’d be interested in jamming. So, it was he and I at the start. He knew of Hans, but had never met him. He just knew that Hans was a SABBATH fanatic. I tried a couple of other people before we jammed with Hans, but Hans had that combination of heaviness and swing that was just right for us. We played like that for a while, just the three of us, ‘cos it took some time to find the right second guitar player. Again, we tried a couple of other people before Staffan came along. Actually, Staffan and I were house mates. He asked to hear some demos, and liked the songs, and it felt right playing together straight from the start. We’re very lucky in that we’ve found just the right people both musically and personality-wise. We’re all great friends.

Patrik, you told me in Munich quite some of the story how the band got its deal with Napalm Records – could you please share this with us again?

Patrik: Well, we had our first gig ever as suport act to UNCLE ACID AND THE DEADBEATS and the place was packed, over 400 people in the audience! A friend of mine filmed the first song wich was Wisdom and he sent it to me after the show. We looked at it and we felt really happy about it. We decided to send it out to record labels just to show them that we were around and thought that some would maybe react to it and give us some feedback? And man did they react! We got positive feedback from 6 labels who wrote that they wanted to hear more and that they might be interested in signing us, some even offered a deal from just this video. Napalm answered a couple of days before christmas last year and Sebastian A&R at the label wrote that this was among the best stuff he had heard in a long time and that he really wanted to work with us but needed to hear some more music before signing us. The fun thing was that we just started the recording of our debut album but we had no demo stuff recorded att all so we told him that he had to wait ’till the album was mixed and mastered before hearing any recordings. He told us that the owner would not allow him to sign us without hearing some proper recordings but we told him again that he had to wait ’till the album was done and i also told him that we had 5 more labels who showed really big interest in us from the live video. While recording the album we did a live recording of a full show in Gothenburg and sent it to Napalm. Sebastian loved it and took a meeting with his boss and got allowed for the first time to give a proposition to a band just from a live video. The rest is history.

How well does it work to have four people with totally different backgrounds (Tom being the Globetrotter with at least another band, currently HORISONT, Staffan so much younger, Patrik and Hans being married)?

Tom: It’s funny, but we get along amazingly well. It could be weird, but it isn’t. As long as everyone’s on the same page in terms of enthusiasm and commitment, it can work. And we are. We all love this band, and are willing to put in the time to make it something special. Hans may be almost double Staffan’s age, but the maturity level’s pretty much the same. Ha!

You just been on your very first tour supporting LONELY KAMEL in Europe – how was the experience with the new band?

Tom: it was totally great! I mean, just from the standpoint of LONELY KAMEL being really fun guys to be on tour with, it was a great time for all of us. Musically, it was a big experience for us too. I’ve done a lot of tours before, but never with a new band where I’ve been involved from the start. It was almost a bit scary to go out in front of people without the safety net of a tried and true name to fall back on. We were out there for the first time. There were always a few people in the audience who had heard the album, but most people were hearing us for the first time. We had some amazing moments where we got huge reactions from people, and that felt good. One guy in the UK saw us in Glasgow, and then followed us to two more shows, even sleeping in his car to make it possible. That kind of reaction is something you dream about.

Oh, that HAT again…!

Looking at 2015, THE ORDER OF ISRAFEL are announced for Sweden Rock and Gothenburg Sound already. Are there any other festivals coming up, like Freak Valley, Hammer of Doom etc and will there be another tour to look forward to?

Tom: Yes, I believe there are already two more festivals that we have agreed to do so far. We can’t say anything until they announce the shows, sorry! Hopefully, the next tour won’t be far off too.

According to the bands’ Facebook page there is serious work on songs for the next album going on – when can we exspect the successor of “Wisdom” to be out?

Tom: It’s hard to say at this point. I guess we’ll book the studio once the shape of the album is becoming clearer. I have a lot of songs saved that we haven’t worked on yet as a band. Things usually take longer than you think they will, so I would say early 2016? Maybe? He he! I personally can’t wait to get to work on some of these songs. It will be fun on tour to be able to play a different set every night.

Talking about songwriting, how does that work, do you have one conniving dictator or actually work together with everyone?

Tom: That’s me! I’m the evil dictator! Ha ha! In The Order, it’s me who comes up with almost-finished songs, and then we work on them together, and the other guys work on the details of what they’re going to play. It really is a band feeling, though. Patrik commented on the fact that even though I come up with the songs, he feels very much that it’s his bass playing style that you hear, and that he feels free to do what comes naturally to him. Everyone in the band makes huge contributions to the sound of the band, Actually, the first sound you hear on the album is Staffan’s guitar, and it’s a guitar part that he came up with. So, the concept and songs are me, but everyone’s DNA is very much a part of what you hear.

With the end of 2014 ahead: What is your favourite album of the year?

Tom: I think Patrik and I have both said that for us, it’s THE SKULL’s ‘For Those Which Are Asleep’. It’s exactly that classic doom sound that is so close to my heart. Real songs, beautiful riffs. I can’t wait to see them play some time. And we’d love to tour with them. It seems that stylistically, we’d be a perfect match for each other.

And finally, any last words?

Thanks to everyone who has checked us out. We’ll be on tour again soon, I hope! Cheers!

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THE ORDER OF ISRAFEL – Feierwerk, Munich – September 14, 2014

Tags

Adelaide, Australia, Church of Misery, Debut Album, European Tour, Feierwerk Munich, Gothenburg, Hans Lilja, Horisont, Japan, Lonely Kamel, Morning Sun, Napalm Records, Norway, Oslo, Patrik Andersson Winberg, Staffan Björck, Sweden, The Order Of Israfel, Tom Sutton, Wisdom

Once again she was calling for me, the big city – calling for big city nights as the new kids on the block were set to visit Munich during their first ever European tour, which happens to be their first tour ever. With the debut album “Wisdom” at hand, THE ORDER OF ISRAFEL bring some spicy Swedish tunes to southern Germany and I for one just could not miss out on this opportunity. Not at last for the chance to catch up with former CHURCH OF MISERY string-bender Tom Sutton (who relocated from Australia, to Japan and finally to Europe), this being his latest joint venture apart from his being the on-again-off-again or stand-in string-bender for Gothenburg-based Classic Hard Rock outfit HORISONT.

Small stage, still enough room for professional posing!

To make a long introduction shot(er), after stumbling upon the title track of their first attempt – a ten plus minutes epos of such a tremendous beauty and undisputable versatility – I’ve gotten quite nutts with this new band. Only downer would have to be the fact, that THE ORDER – Tom Sutton (vocals&guitars) Patrik Andersson Winberg (bass), Hans Lilja (drums) & Staffan Björck (guitars) – was only opening for Oslo Rockers LONELY KAMEL for the run of live shenanigans. But chance has it, that my name was on the list for the night, or rather my name was the entire list at Feierwerk, Munich. Third show on the schedule and with the big city audience not quite what this foursome deserves.

Boots, Clogs & Bell-Bottoms – These guys know how to dress!

After a bit of a pumpy start, the four musicians deliver fine selection of tracks from the first release “Wisdom” that add to a good half hour. Way too little time to truly enjoy all of the bands’ greatness and well-established musicianship. But that’s the thing with the opening slot. Anyway, the five songs chosen manage to represent the album well enough – from the aforementioned ‘Wisdom’, to up-tempo tracks like ‘The Noctuus’ and the grant finale with ‘Morning Sun’ – an upright invitation to all headbangers – THE ORDER OF ISRAFEL know their game and they play it in a full pro manner, remaining fans of the music themselves first and foremost.

The Order Of Riffage – Staffan & Tom

The trip to Munich was once again all worth while and THE ORDER OF ISRAFEL is a name one should learn to spell right, cuz they sure will make their way in the long run – at least if they live up to their own Wisdom!

Tracklist – see below

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