Tonight
I headed down to the Academy in Bristol to catch
the Black Veil Brides headline the sold out venue
with Heaven’s Basement in support, I arrived
into Bristol around 5pm and the queue outside
the venue was massive spanning right up the hill
and around the corner with hundreds of fans dressed
in black with their war paint on waiting patiently
for the doors to open so they could find their
viewing space for the night ahead.
Over
the years at Alternative Vision we have been very
supportive of Heaven’s Basement and tonight
they played such an explosive 40minute set that
I would imagine the majority of the people in
the venue walked away as newly turned Heaven’s
Basement fans.
The band blasted right into ‘Welcome Home’
which happens to be the opening track from their
debut album Filthy Empire and also happens to
be one of the most solid sounding fast paced tracks
I have heard all year and as soon as Heaven’s
Basement kicked off with it they had the crowd
on their side as front man Aaron Buchanan spent
the whole song charging
around and moving his hands like a possessed man,
the energy he was letting out was outstanding
and this kept up for the whole of the bands 8
song set, whilst the rest of the band equally
put on an impressive performance with drummer
Chris Rivers giving his kit a beating with ease
and guitarist Sid Glover and bassiest Rob Ellershaw
charging across the full length of the stage with
Glover showing off every now and again laying
down some riffs with his guitar positioned behind
his head.
Through
their set Heaven’s Basement played the likes
of ‘Can’t Let Go’, ‘Fire,
Fire’, ‘I Am Electric’, ‘Heartbreaking
Son Of A Bitch’ and closed the set with
their album closer ‘Executioner’s
Day’ and throughout each and every one of
these tracks both the band and the crowd let off
a lot of the energy as the band were unleashing
the rock on stage whilst the crowd was bopping
away and singing along pretty much word for word
with their horns in the air.
Within
minutes of Heaven’s Basement leaving the
stage there were extremely loud chants of “BVB”
as the whole venue started chanting for their
heroes to take to the stage, the chants would
die down after a couple of minutes and restart
up shortly after and this was the routine for
the whole 30minute break between the two bands
and as soon as the lights dimmed for the Black
Veil Brides to take to the stage the screams from
the fans was ear piercingly painful.
As
soon as the Black Veil Brides took to the stage
they kicked off with a triple whammy of songs
from their most recent album Wretched And Divine
with ‘Shadows Die’, ‘I Am Bulletproof’
and ‘Wretched And Divine’ being the
three songs and straight away I noticed that in
the eleven months since they last toured the UK
their whole stage presence and energy has improved
majorly and that is not to say that the band put
on a poor show before as tonight was the sixth
time I have seen the Black Veil Brides live and
each and every time I have walked away impressed
but tonight things felt that little bit more special
as the
band had a big platform at the front of the stage
where Jake Pitts, Ashley Purdy and Jinxx spent
the majority of the show charging across whilst
laying down some amazingly technical riffs and
beefy basslines whilst front man Andy Biersack
worked the crowd up well using the platform to
strike many different poses like he was a contestant
on Project Runway or Americans Next Top Model,
the band had also ditched the makeup tonight which
shows to me that the band are ready to go off
to create album number 4 where I imagine they
will come back bigger, better and more mature
than ever before.
The
whole of tonight’s set was full of fan favourites
and it was great to see that the Black Veil Brides
still class their earlier music relevant as they
smashed their way through the likes of ‘Knives
And Pens’ and ‘Perfect Weapon’
in a perfect way where Andy Biersack really laid
down the aggressive screams just like back in
the day.
As the set progressed we were treated to a cover
of Billy Idol’s ‘Rebel Yell’
which seems to be a regular feature in the band’s
set’s these days and it is easy to see why
as the band have somehow managed to make the song
sounds more exciting than the original, shortly
after this we were treated to a drum solo by Christian
Coma
and throughout the whole performance the fans
were chanting “CC, CC, CC” in appreciation
to him, and I have to say the solo he preformed
tonight was outstanding and a had a good variety
with a bit of dance music thrown in for good measures
with Christian Coma pretty much dancing on top
of his kit.
The set came to an end with ‘Nobody’s
Hero’ and was shortly followed up with an
encore of ‘Fallen Angles’ and ‘In
The End’ which finished the show in a massive
sing-a-long way.
Overall
tonight’s show was a perfect end to a massive
year of gigging for us at Alternative Vision as
Heaven’s Basement were on top form and are
easily going to have an even more successful year
next year and the Black Veil Brides proved that
after years of being a band they are ready to
take things to the next level and I am sure that
whenever album number 4 drops the Black Veil Brides
will be back and ready to conquer bigger venues
as let’s face it they have the fan base
for it as these shows sold out many months in
advanced and anyone who failed to get tickets
really missed out as tonight’s show really
showed the Black Veil Brides at the top of their
game in front of such a dedicated following.
Heaven’s Basement 5/5
Black Veil Brides 5/5
Review By Trigger
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