Tag: church of the 8th day

Heavy Metal UFO: Voivod and Revocation at El Rey

Rob Shepyer October 10, 2019

Of all the major players of metal, the bands that inspired entire movements and sub-genres, Voivod seemed to be the one I had yet to see perform. Now, having seen them play El Rey, I can’t believe their heavy metal UFO didn’t come across my radar sooner. I always knew them on a surface level, their cover of Pink Floyd’s “Astronomy Domine”, their music videos on Jamey Jasta’s Headbanger’s Ball, and as the band Jason Newsted went to after Metallica. Having learned more about their style of songwriting, their early performances where Snake wore a gas mask, and the incredible virtuosic and outside the box instrumentation of their late guitarist, Piggy; I now think this is one of the most important and essential metal bands of all time. related content: For Every Season Turn, Turn, Turn: Turnover And Turnstile At El Rey The albums Killing Technology and Nothing Face changed progressive and thrash metal, all while sounding like a nuclear war. They made noise simultaneously melodic and metallic and made nonsensical arrangements intriguing. What could be considered odd about this show was that the metal legends weren’t headlining. This bill was vehicle for Revocation’s The Outer Ones album. Revocation and Psycroptic,

Set the Animals Free: Wolfbrigade and Dropdead at 1720

Rob Shepyer September 20, 2019

There have been a couple shows this year I was patiently waiting months and months for. The anticipation for Wolfbrigade’s one-off return to Southern California was high and it expressed itself in an immensely rowdy crowd. This was only enhanced by the addition of power violence legends Dropdead, who flew in from Rhode Island, just to unleash their new music onto 1720. These were real punk rockers in attendance. Power violence brethren, crust punk cavalcades, grindcore sadists, all were there and cleaned the local liquor mart of all their tall cans. Even before the show, the line itself was a spectacle, with many a drunken bruiser having to be kicked to the curb. I arrived to see Final Conflict and with a broken string giving the band a certain unhinged and angry attitude, one could already tell this was going to be an especially brutal evening. As Church of the 8th Day‘s go to punk opener for shows like these, one might think they’ve seen the band enough times to know what to expect but this set was different, they were more on-edge and you could feel it in the music. You can teach an old dog new tricks, or you

The 1720th Circle of Hell: Deicide at 1720

Rob Shepyer June 4, 2019

When I was a kid, with my shopping relegated to either Hot Topic or Rockabilia.com/Infinity1, a Deicide shirt was a must in my mind. I think the only variable that went into my fashion sense was shock factor in those days and simply the name Deicide gave my private school faculty a rotten taste in their mouth. With the upside-down cross burned into his forehead far from faded, Glenn Benton stepped back onto hell on Earth, Los Angeles, to bring his legendary death metal band Deicide to 1720. related content: Photo Recap: Decibel Magazine Tour With Cannibal Corpse At The Fonda The moment I stepped into the venue, I realized metal shows at 1720 are something truly special. There’s a feel that other venues simply can’t imitate, something more street, crowded, concrete-feeling, underground than any of the other venues can conjure. The first band I saw on this evening was Jungle Rot, a death metal band with loads of groove I had been dying to see for awhile. They were incredible, truly riveting and able to inspire every part of your body to get into a head-bang. They definitely met and exceeded my expectations. Origin, who I saw play with Morbid

Decibel Metal & Beer Fest After Party: Ghoul at El Cid

Rob Shepyer December 10, 2018

Night 1 of Decibel Magazine‘s Metal and Beer Festival polished off The Wiltern with a diabolically thrash set by Testament. Bodies were broken, souls lost, but the night didn’t end there, the metal heads needed more, they needed blood. The die hards swarmed eastward to El Cid after the show where Church of the 8th Day brought Ghoul and Gost out of their cages to play the after show. I hadn’t seen Ghoul live up until this show and prior to it, they seemed to be getting hyped up to me from all directions. I distinctly remember being unsatisfied with Gwar and the lacking metal-feel of their show. It felt like metal for kids that weren’t passionate about the genre. Nothing more than a break from bands that no one would ever call heavy so that they could feel extreme for the duration of a single set and go back to safer sounds. Ghoul, on the other hand, represents a true alternative in the world of comedic theatrical metal performance. The music was brutal and more death metal inspired. The comedy was blacker and against the grain of all politically correct standards. I fucking loved it. related content: The Growlers

Decibel Metal & Beer Fest Pre-Party: Armored Saint at the Troubadour

Rob Shepyer December 10, 2018

Decibel Magazine brought out a slew of amazing bands for their wild Metal and Beer Festival weekend which featured Testament, Power Trip, Godflesh, and culminated with legendary proto-black metal front man, Tom G. Warrior’s Triptykon, playing a set of Celtic Frost classics. My Metal & Beer Festival weekend began the Friday night before the festival with a pre-party at The Troubadour which featured big bands on a small stage, headlined by Metal Blade records’ legendary Armored Saint. related content: Photo Recap: Toxic Holocaust At Resident Armored Saint is a bit of an anomaly in heavy metal history. They brought a hard rock traditional sound to 80’s metal and combined that with European power metal aesthetics and medieval imagery. Their iconic album, Symbol of Salvation, gave the band their biggest hits with bangers from start to finish. The band toured earlier in the year, playing the album from start to finish but on this show, the band was loose and wanted to make this intimate show feel like a hang, where they could play the songs they wanted to from all over their catalogue. The entire bill was stacked with UADA beginning my evening. American black metal never sounded so fierce and haunting as

Photo Recap: Toxic Holocaust at Resident

Janky Smooth Central Command December 9, 2018

Toxic Holocaust is a band that shines most as a headlining act. It’s still a treat catching them on tour with bigger bands or at fest, but the mixed crowd they bring on their own makes for a wild (and occasionally dangerous) time. Their recent performance at Resident is a perfect example of metalheads and punks losing their minds alongside each other to some of the most memorable thrash tracks released over the past decade. The night opened with SoCal crossover act Take Offense and LA heroes Scrapmetal and Parasite. Resident has earned it’s title as the (unofficial) home of metal and punk this year and I’m excited to see what acts they host in 2019. Photos by: Dillon Vaughn Toxic Holocaust Take Offense

Recontamination: Dying Fetus at the Regent

Dillon Vaughn October 18, 2018

A recent conversation with a friend resolved with an agreement that metal in L.A. is alive and kicking; a realization landed upon mostly after discussing the insanity we each witnessed at separate shows on the same night. The show my friend went to at 1720 was a stacked tech death bill featuring Obscura, Beyond Creation, Archspire, and more while I attended the rebirth of Relapse Records’ legendary Contamination Tour with Dying Fetus, Incantation, Gatecreeper, and Genocide Pact over at the Regent. Comparing the two lineups is a challenge for any balanced/general death metal fan and it made me fear one of the two events would suffer from poor attendance. Surprisingly, the distinction between the subgenres worked in each event’s favor and packed both venues with diehards losing their minds and paying respect to some of their favorite bands. related content: Morbid Angel At The Regent: A Lesson In Death Opening the night over at the Regent was one of the most recent groups to sign to Relapse: Genocide Pact. Their last performance in LA was a headlining set at Union back in 2016 that flew under the radar of most. With major label support the band’s reputation has grown quickly and attracted

The Final Final ACxDC Reunion at Resident

Rob Shepyer October 4, 2018

Antichrist Demoncore. ACxDC. Were one of the craziest power violence bands of all time. Few missed shows bug me as much as missing their final show at Union in 2017. I felt terrible for this, like I had betrayed everything I ever stood for. Then when ACxDC announced they were playing a show at The Resident presented by Church of the 8th Day, not only was I ready to go but I was ready to party, buy merch, drink beer, and get hurt. The lineup was stacked from top to bottom. Two beer bands, a reunion, and a straight edge hardcore band all the way from Amsterdam all brought together on a Monday. Work the next morning didn’t stop the die hards though. They were ready to get their excuse not to come in the next day get planted right across their faces. Skullcrack cracked open this can of whoop ass of a night with no remorse and a thirst for blood. One of the heaviest, most brutal, and rhythmic crossover bands I have ever seen. Their singer’s voice rips and their guitarist is a goddamn hardcore-thrash titan in the making, playing with Fireburn when he’s not with these three young

Prophets of Doom: Yob and Acid King at Teragram

Rob Shepyer September 14, 2018

In times of social decay, metalheads thirst for one specific strain of heavy music to level their peeking frustrations and fears simply by crushing them equal to all other feelings. Call it masochistic but with all the suffering in the world, being enveloped by riffs so heavy that your teeth tremble in your gums, actually treats the pain. So, give us heavy, crushing guitars. Give us slow riffs that stretch longer than life lines. Give us drums that crash like thunder in storms too thick to see through. Give us doom, impending, loud, and full of sorrow. Doom is the sonic version of the abyss we stare into and see our reflections in. No American doom band today is quite as powerful live as Yob. Not since Saint Vitus has this subgenre seen such soul within it. I take plenty of bands into account when I make this bold verdict and if you disagree then leave me with my opinions to a solitary death and purple satin upholstered casket. related content: Pallbearer & Gatecreeper Stop At Echoplex Reminds Us- Guitar Solos Matter Doom lyrics in reviews aside, Church of the 8th Day booked another monstrous show with Yob, Acid Bath,

Unplugged and Undying: Six Organs of Admittance, Wino, and Xasthur at Resident

Rob Shepyer August 30, 2018

When Bob Dylan first plugged in and went electric at the Newport Folk Festival in 1963, he was harangued, mocked, and shit on by the same followers that professed their total devotion to him as a folk singer. Similarly, when metal goes acoustic, there are always detractors. Yet, with the talent exhibited by the artists Church of the 8th Day booked to play The Resident, Xasthur, Wino, and Six Organs of Admittance, the voices of those detractors seemed to shrink under the monumental weight of the emotions in these folk songs. Proving that Kansas can be just as dark as Darkthrone, Alhambra’s Xasthur was once a one-man black metal machine, pumping out the haziest, most brutal black metal in California. Having soaked in all of isolation’s inspiration, Scott Conner knew there were muses he had to follow beyond the boundaries of electric music. Startling the purist following he had garnered, Xasthur went acoustic and the fans that once battled his skeptics, became skeptics themselves. related content: Satyricon’s Final Los Angeles Show: A Night Too Blackened To Forget Taking the stage as a three-piece, all on acoustic guitars, Xashur wore a bandana to cover his face while Christopher sang his lyrics and

Live Desolation: Khemmis at the Echoplex

Dillon Vaughn July 10, 2018

Performing an album in it’s entirety is generally reserved for bands with monumental releases; devoting a night to a single release shows confidence in the structure and integrity of the album as a whole and seemingly elevates the title and importance of the gig from a show to an “event.” Doubling down on the critical success of their previous releases, Khemmis performed their new album Desolation in full recently at the Echoplex for the first night of a very short run of intimate album release shows in LA, Chicago, and Denver. related content: Los Angeles Strikefest At The Regent: By Die-Hards, For Die-Hards Desolation was something I avoided listening to before the show as I wanted my first experience to be in a live setting. I had only seen Khemmis once before – at last year’s Psycho Las Vegas – and while a late afternoon festival set time doesn’t generally lend as well to showcasing a bands strength as a headlining set does, their performance was still something that cemented me as a fan and remains a highlight of the weekend. That being said, the LA event did not disappoint. Beginning the night with a powerful performance of Hunted’s title

Los Angeles Strikefest at the Regent: By Die-hards, For Die-hards

Dillon Vaughn July 6, 2018

Festival season is here and California has no shortage of options for niche entertainment seekers; from Arroyo Seco Weekend and Smokin’ Grooves to Burger Boogaloo and Summertime in LB, whatever musical religion you subscribe to has it’s fair share of representation. Delving into the true deep-cut side of things, there’s one fest that stands out as the real assembly for die-hards: Los Angeles Strikefest. Created and lovingly curated by the heavy hitting Church of the 8th Day and Nightforce Productions (a new face in the LA metal scene) version 1.0 of Strike Fest didn’t pull any punches and delivered three nights of bucket-list worthy acts. related content: The De-Evolution of Burger Boogaloo The first evening was the shortest of the three but remained far from being a pre-show. Fans were treated to sets from Los Angeles’ own media darlings Dread and Blade Killer, Matt Harvey (of Exhumed) performing in both Pounder and the reunion of Dekapitator, and a very hyped and rare performance by Detroit’s Demon Bitch. Closing out the night was Nasty Savage, the band serving one of the most direct examples of bleeding for the art. Warned by security to watch for “flying glass and metal and shit”