So, I spent best part of 6 hours on the roads today, leaving the house at 7 this morning. Tired and whathaveyou.
Crawll are first. The first time I saw them impressed me, or at least left an impression. This time, well,you know I'm bored of nu-metal. They're a product of their generation, which is fine, I'm a product of mine, it's just we're different generations. So all these bands need now to be something special to mean anything to me, just being competant, which to be fair most of them are, isn't enough. Crawll manage to standout because of the female vocalist, who emits an earth shuddering scream, and actually projects on stage. Sure, a lot of the moves are very current, and something I just don't get, but they leave an impression, and there is a moment during closer Bite My Lip, when it's just the vocals, that is eery. The music for the most part is standard, if it was just that, then they'd be just another band, but like I said, they have that element to leave an impression.
And Diasphere are another nu-metal band effectively, but I guess familiarity breeds content in this case. There's a fair few people here, and unlike the previous couple of times, some of them actually stand, and, gasp, move. There's a few new tracks thrown in, which seem to indicate they're developing more of their own style, and they're throwing in more backing vocals as well these days.
To be fair, everything that went before is obliterated by Skindred. Let's be honest, Benjii's voice and presence fills and dominates the room. The loud shirt makes a change to the black of the room, the vocals ooze soul and passion as well as aggression. The music? Well, I'd not heard any before tonight, so it's difficult to say. It feels harder than Dub War were, punkier almost. Whether it's got the hooks and subtleties, time will tell. I bought the demo at the end, so will let you know in time. There's passionate speeches from Benjii about supporting UK bands, staying away from Heroin and giving respect etc. The time passes quickly. We all know DW got messed over by Earache, let's hope that Skindred can learn from the past mistakes.