I left off any bands I happened to see but didn’t really enjoy, and five of the bands listed I saw at Gods of Metal in Italy, but that still leaves 23 sets from quality mid- to big-name metal bands. And 14 were from Europe.<\/p>\n
Opeth: Exceeded my expectations (Milwaukee Metalfest)<\/p>\n
Anathema: Amazing emotional performance, exceed my expectations by about 10 times. (Metalfest)<\/p>\n
Dark Tranquillity: Highlight of the Gods of Metal fest, Stanne just rules.<\/p>\n
Iron Maiden: Their show in Chicago wasn’t nearly as cool as their one in Italy, but it’s Maiden, so both shows still rank near the top of the list.<\/p>\n
Arch Enemy: 2 shows in one weekend, blew headliners Nevermore away both times.<\/p>\n
Immortal: Great stage presence from three guys, and I’m pretty sure guitarist Abbath is really Jon Schaffer in corpsepaint.<\/p>\n
Mayhem: Blood, corpsepaint, and black metal. Plus, they can play! (Metalfest)<\/p>\n
Demons & Wizards: Hansi and Jon in Italy, yeah that’s fun.<\/p>\n
In Flames: Their music might be a bit stagnant, but it’s still fun to hear at a show.<\/p>\n
Moonspell: What a good-looking band.<\/p>\n
The Kovenant: Cool show, not enough of a crowd there though, and not enough songs.<\/p>\n
Sentenced: One band I would have rather seen on a small stage rather than at Gods of Metal<\/p>\n
Maudlin of the Well: Ten people on stage, it must be good!<\/p>\n
Shadows Fall: Good live band, I should probably get their CD.<\/p>\n
Children of Bodom: Like In Flames, not the most exciting music on disc, but it’s good for banging your head to.<\/p>\n
Amorphis: Cool stuff, maybe a little too laid back though.<\/p>\n
Dream Theater: would have enjoyed it more if I wasn’t so far back in the crowd.<\/p>\n
Nevermore: Always decent, never mind-blowing. Think I’ve seen them too many times.<\/p>\n
Rain Fell Within: hooray for skinny chicks!<\/p>\n
Garden of Shadows: hooray for guitar-playing chicks!<\/p>\n
Edguy: The only Euro-power-metal band I’ve ever seen.<\/p>\n
Queensryche: just seemed soulless.<\/p>\n
Halford: Eh?<\/p>\n
Ok, I think I got ’em all. If I’m able to see this many good bands next year, I’ll be quite happy.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I left off any bands I happened to see but didn’t really enjoy, and five of the bands listed I saw at Gods of Metal in Italy, but that still leaves 23 sets from quality mid- to big-name metal bands. And 14 were from Europe. Opeth: Exceeded my expectations (Milwaukee Metalfest) Anathema: Amazing emotional performance, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-concert"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gregie.com\/neil\/words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gregie.com\/neil\/words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gregie.com\/neil\/words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gregie.com\/neil\/words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gregie.com\/neil\/words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.gregie.com\/neil\/words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gregie.com\/neil\/words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gregie.com\/neil\/words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gregie.com\/neil\/words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}