Dear friends,

i just have added a new festivity report to ghul.org

Please enjoy!

PROJECT MES

While I watched the slowly increasing number of visitors this evening, Project Mes made it’s way on stage. This means some kind of Trip Hop, Wave and Industrial. I was curious about the mix. The Apple computer was ready and so was the fanclub of that guy. Project Mes is just one guy, you should know. Well, the Augsburger Kantine gives young and regional musicians a fair chance and heavily supports the local scene. But this evening Project Mes could not give shivers of excitement to me. This One-Man-Band tried to overwhelm us with several accessoires, but well, One-Man is just One-Man, and finally it didn’t work. Project Mes is a project with some good musical ideas, but the live show must envolve more – sorry to say that.

AKANOID

AKANOID entered the stage and I didn’t know anything about them. The four musicians were routinated and I hoped the best. In fact I could hear after the first tunes that the band played some kind of a brilliant and modern gothic rock (todays it’s called Electro Pop ). These lads, fronted by the singer Hilton are supporting the whole CRÜXSHADOWS tour and let me hope of following: first they need a website – myspace is to less . Second I really hope this band makes its way to the Wave Gotik Treffen soon, cause I would like to view them on a more big stage. They are great and deserve that. Unfortuneatly not all of the audience recognized that fact. Altough they get much applause, I was very alone in front of the stage – nobody except me and two other photographs were there. The Audience kept an 8 metre security space. This couldn’t happen for 20 years, I thought! Hiltons voice, even when a bit croaky, is very impressive and professional, deep and sympathic. He pushes his songs forward in a very energetic way. Phil convinces with an precise guitareplay and a whirlwind show. In fact I felt remembered to the extremly cool psychobilly band STELLAR CORPSES, even when Phil is younger and the CORPSES still have more movement on stage. However, thats not a bad thing, I think nobody on the world can compete in that point with STELLAR CORPSES as of today. Dirk supported the band with a very precise drum tough, and Daggy, even when looking a bit bored this evening, helped at a competent level and at the end we had a very compact package. Just the everything crushing bass guitar wasn’t there – and that was very bad indeed, cause I am a bass fetishist as some of you know. Everything sounded very well, just a bit to much at high frequencies. Maybe that lack of bass was the reason why the people didn’t go in front of the stage, who knows? The musical style remembers me on different bands, sometimes Depeche Mode, sometimes modern Silke Bischoff, sometimes it was very unique. It was a diversified set, all songs were composed very good and had a great arrangment. I guess, this band is the one to support Wolfsheim on tour. Altough Hiltons voice overturned sometimes in the high regions, this concert was played very well and I was the opinion this one was a good one. Who likes groovy Electro Pop should support AKANOID from germany – and maybe step directly in front of the stage and have a party.

CRÜXSHADOWS

When the CRÜXSHADOWS slowly entered the stage, the Audience jumped suddenly directly in front of stage. It felt like an dark wave coming together over my head. Now, beeing so close to others, it was a bit more difficult to take some photos. The first tunes made all of the silent Swabians scream: Ok, i thought, easy game for CRÜXSHADOWS. In fact the CRÜXSHADOWS have most success in germany. Who sees them, knows why. 7 guys entered the stage an start with plausible songs, much of boum boum and naked woman. It’s some kind of a dark techno music. And hej, meanwhile this is now todays state of the art i guess, at least in europe. Well, I never did see a band with such an perfectly arranged live show. Did I mention routine in the same sentence with AKANOID? Compared to CRÜXSHADOWS that was a chaotic fly hustle and bustle. Now every grip was perfect. Even at the mix Rogue, Vocalist and Boss of the CRÜXSHADOWS, had a huge impact. At the beginning he stepped several times to a box, did something and at the end lots more of for example basses were to hear. Well, this does not surprise people who know that the CRÜXSHADOWS are playing 100 concerts in a year. You could feel it. Two dancers could be seen on stage, sometimes wearing flags or bondage tapes, sometimes just dancing without accessoires. We are not talking about some kind of ‘hey we have some girls here, they are sexy’. We are speaking of real dancers, who really know how to do their job. We are speaking of bent bodys, arrangement and moves which are perfectly in sync with the songs. We are speaking of an absolutly professional level. You had the feeling that those girls were part of the band, and i swear, some of the younger lads must have sleepless nights by now. Also talented as a dancer was Valerie, the guitar player. Beautyful as all the ladys, she couldn’t decide between dancing and guitarplaying, and that was good. Here you couldn’t see heavy metal solos, but a very unique kind of playing guitar. A lot of female charms here which filled the gaps of the very plausible but simple compositions of CRÜXSHADOWS. I enjoyed that show, really. But Rogue excelled his front ladys. Wildly he jumped into the audience, wearing a headset, jumped upon high tables, danced arm in arm with some visitors or climbed some loose stools. Wearing some lightening assecoires he knew what he would did this evening, and I know this kind of show you see often at the CRÜXSHADOWS. Audience was fond and the party grew from minute to minute. Some people say, that Rogues voice isn’t the best. Well, some tunes he didn’t manage, but you can only hear that, cause his voice is a very dominant one. Other bands may sing like him, but they have an guitar carpet behind them, nobody recognizes. However, sometimes it was a bit not perfect sometimes it was very cool. He doesn’t have much octaves, but hej, we shouldn’t care. It’s the same with the great SISTERS OF MERCY. Both violins of David Wood and Johanna Moresco which were always located in the background created a very together with mastress of synths Jen Jawidzik a 100% perfectly together working team. The set has been played very tight and precise. Sometimes you were stunned how precise this all was and sometimes I couldn’t simply believe how this could be so much perfect. However, party was great. And meanwhile i think, this is todays music. Gone are the times of Batcave, Pogo and The Cure or 45 Graves. Todays music is like CRÜXSHADOWS play. As you could read, this concert was very great. This year some more interesting concerts will happen for the dark audience. Next time I’ll visit CINEMA STRANGE, maybe ANNE CLARK and of course DER FLUCH which I allready saw at the WGT. The Kantine is the right place for those bands and has lots of parking areas right before the door

Further reading

ORIGINAL TEXT AT GHUL.ORG

BERICHT AUF DEUTSCH AUF POSSESSED.DE

http://www.cruxshadows.com/
http://www.myspace.com/cruxshadows
http://www.akanoid.de
http://www.myspace.com/projectmes