Text: André (in cooperation with Aidan); concert pics & videos: Aidan

There are concert evenings that one particularly looks forward to. Without a doubt, 7 May 2022 was one of those days, as Gravety and Seven Sisters, two of our favourite bands, hit the stage at the Helvete in Oberhausen. The cherry on top of the cake was Riot City, of whose live performance Aidan and I were already very impressed in 2020, shortly before the pandemic madness started.

You could already read about it in our interview with Kevin Portz: For our friends from Gravety, the gig was a particularly special one – they were on stage together again for the first time in almost a decade. Against this background, Aidan and I of course didn’t know exactly what to expect. But since we are aware of the passion of the five-piece from the Saarland, we were pretty sure that we would not be disappointed by the live premiere of the great Bow Down songs.

What we then got musically, however, surprised us: From the first second on, the band delivered excellently. If we hadn’t known better, we would have thought that they were playing the 10th gig of a club tour – everything was simply fitting here! The sound was top after 1, 2 minutes, all musicians showed that they are playing in the upper epic heavy metal league and the show they offered was also of the very best. I enjoy gimmicks like tombstones, grave candles and all kinds of other morbid stuff – when I go to a live performance, I like to be entertained, no matter if it’s Maiden, Ghost or Gravety. Master of Ceremonies Kevin is a charismatic apparition on stage who has the audience well in hand – apart from that, he is simply an excellent singer who sounds just as good live as on record.

All in all, Aidan and I were sure after the end of the Saarland band’s live comeback: If there are enough people in our scene with functioning ears, the concert at the Helvete was a door opener – Gravety have the potential to take a prominent role in the billing at smaller and medium-sized festivals. Our dream is undoubtedly to experience them together with Lord Vigo one day – qua atmosphere, there are overlaps here that simply have to be brought together in the foreseeable future…

Finally, we would like to say a big thank you for Kevin’s kind words to the Epic Metal Blog during an announcement from the stage – Aidan and I were very happy about that! Such moments are very precious.

After Gravety, however, there was no time to take a break – the show quickly continued with Seven Sisters. Aidan’s mother had designed very special shirts for this gig, which attracted a lot of attention, not least from Kyle, Graeme, Gaz and Sammy. The fact that she had to stay away due to illness was, of course, particularly bitter for everyone. But postponed is not abandoned…

But about the gig: Seven Sisters proved once again why they are by far one of the best metal bands of their generation – in my opinion they are number 1, not least because they have a guitar duo that doesn’t have to hide from the legends in our scene. When you have a flawless rhythm section at the start, an incredible amount of fun on stage and excellent songs in your luggage, you are a force live. It’s not surprising that the audience was really stoked for the four Englishmen – it’s always hot in the Helvete, but yesterday was even hotter, the venue was on fire and you wished Seven Sisters would just play their entire discography… It should be noted that when Aidan and I saw the setlist on Facebook, we missed favourite numbers like “Seven Sisters“ and “Once and Future King“. In the end, however, the mixture was perfect and we were satisfied in that respect as well. In short: A perfect performance by a talented, pleasant and down-to-earth band that – like Gravety – deserves every kind of support.

After the performances of Gravety and Seven Sisters we were frankly a bit tired. Therefore, we followed the demolition that Riot City provided at the end from the back after a longer stay in the fresh air. The Canadians also scored enormously well thanks to their joy of playing and obviously their class – after their gig, everyone we spoke to was enthusiastic. I especially liked the new material, so I’m already looking forward to the upcoming Riot City record.

All in all, Ansgar from From Beyond Events gave us another great concert evening. The combination of bands was ideal – all based in classic metal, but each with a completely different style. What united them was their likeable demeanour – Aidan and I have probably never had so many nice conversations with band members, if I leave out our Epic Metal Night, that was just as magnificent in that respect.. That’s what makes a concert evening fun – luckily it goes on right away on 15th May…