HORNA

November 1st was a day that I had been looking forward to, probably since the Averse Sefira show. Anthony being a good friend decided to give me a ride and Oliver and Steve tagged along to keep him company. While they were getting Pink's and exploring the Dark Side of LA (pun intended haha), I was in the Black Castle awaiting the much anticipated horde known as Horna.

The first three bands that I really had no intention of watching were alright. Their stage presence wasn't to great and for some reason, this still remains true, a lot of black metal bands tend to not do anything while on stage. I don't understand this concept, is it something that is part of the elite status to act as if you never gave a fuck about performing. Some bands on the otherhand pull it off quite well and makes the show far more dark then it ever was before. One band that I found to be a complete waste of time was Regnum... Their appearances seem to be a joke, stage presence was horrible, and their corpse paint was something similar to this, a white man getting black cum on his face. It was horrible.

The next band was Nekcrium. I had to watch them since I have never seen them before and the vocalist is a friend of mine, so I can't say that I am his friend if I have never seen any of his shows. Anyways, their performance was better than that which was filmed at the AWS outdoor arena. They seemed to be able to get the crowd going and weren't like any of the bands brought up earlier. The vocalist was armed with religious statues which he consistently spatted on, a chain which was used to whip himself like the religious flagellants of old time, and his gauntlets which he had attempted to draw blood with, that was a failure. Their set seemed to loosen everyone up, I on the other hand, felt that I just wanted to enjoy the show from a distance and decided to purchase a Milwaukee's Best. Now, I am a fan of cheap red neck beers, but this was horrible. It was over carbonated and there was absolutely no taste, even Natural Ice is better and that was said to be the most atrocious beer known to man.

Next band was Sumeria, one of my top 5 favorite bands, but I think it's sad to say, I am grown tired of their sets and live performances. I have seen them so many times that it has just become boring. Despite that, I still managed to get myself to be in the front headbanging.

Nocturnal Fear was next and all I have to say is boring. Their music seems a bit too chaotic and unorganized that it leaves you in a state of confusion. It seemed like nobody was able to get into it but there was one aspect of the bad that was interesting. The guitarist has a full upper body of tattoos, I was unable to see what it was exactly, but just have a full body is amazing.

Blood Stained Dusk was next, and the friend rule comes in once again. Earlier, I had finally been able to met, the man who has created my gauntlets, Profana, the drummer of BSD. It was a refreshing taste of music since it was all tremolo picking and keyboards were put to use. I found their set to be one of the most interesting ever, I didn't expect them to do their clean recitals and their motivational speeches. I think without those their set would be far more different.

Last but definitely not least, Horna, at this time, practically everybody was huddled at the front of the stage. The venue of 100+ strong were all gathered in front screaming Horna and song requests, which I am very sure half of their pronounciations were horribly off. Anyways, as soon as Corvus came on, which had an odd yet menacing look, and something far off from the traditional corpse paint wear, the crowd went nuts. He screeches sent chills down your back and his presence got the crowd going throughout. Although I didn't stay for part of their set, Kuoleva Lupaus was amazing. This is on record so far, my favorite song, and I didn't think it could have gotten any better. At first, there were technical difficulties but once Shatraug got that under control everything was in perfect clarity. This song was completely different from that of the record, it consisted of blues-like soloing over the standard tremolo of the actual song.

Aside from that, it was a great show to end my show season, I don't have any intention of attending any shows for quite some time, sadly, I will have to miss Krieg's CA show which I will regret later, but you always have to put priorities first.