Trivium with Sabaton and Huntress in Omaha: September 29, 2016

For the second week in a row, I found myself driving down to Omaha on a Thursday night to catch a metal concert with my wife, who is getting more and more interested.  Things have come a long ways since she was falling asleep during the Opeth and Overkill concerts.  This concert was headlined by Trivium, a band that I loved when I was in law school.  I will say that I was more interested in seeing Huntress than Trivium, and I had not heard Sabaton before.  I have liked some of Trivium's stuff after The Crusade, but I did not check out their two most recent albums at all.  Huntress's album made it into my Top 5 of 2013, but again, I have not checked out their more recent output.

Huntress was the first to take the stage and they did sound excellent.  Jill Janus's voice was in top form for the most part, other than when she was doing screaching vocals.  It was the guitar work of Eli Santana that was the most impressive aspect of the band's show.  Huntress did play "I Want to Fuck You to Death", which was one of their best songs off of Starbound Beast.  I was not aware that Lemmy Kilmister helped write the song before last night.  Janus told the story of wanting to have the venerable Motorhead singer co-write a song with her and he presented the lyrics to this song.  Huntress plays classic-sounding pure metal and Janus's vocal range is awesome.  It was a great way to start off what would be a great night of metal.

I have apparently missed out on something with Sabaton.  They had a huge fanbase present at the show.  As I mentioned, I had not heard Sabaton before, as power metal has never been one of my particular favorite subgenres.  But they blew the roof off.  Emboldened by some terrific fan response, they were energetic and charismatic on stage and played some damn catchy songs.  Sabaton was definitely the highlight of the night, and it is not very often that a supporting band can really say that.  I will definitely be checking out some of the band's discography.  My wife was also very impressed with Sabaton, which is surprising, to say the least.

Finally, Trivium took the stage.  I am much more familiar with their catalog than the other two bands and recognized most of the songs they played.  And they played most of the songs that I expected.  Their setlist encompassed their entire output, even one song off of their very first album.  Trivium is usually at their best when they are avoiding the harsh vocals of their past, and thankfully they only played a couple of those songs.  The dueling guitar attack of Cory Beaulieu and Matt Heafy is definitely the band's strength and took center stage last night as well.  I was a little surprised that Trivium played "In Waves" as their encore, instead of the tailor-made for an encore "Anthem (We are the Fire)".

All in all, last night was a lot of fun for the both of us.  I was pleasantly surprised by Trivium's show, but Sabaton were definitely the highlight of the night.  

Blind Guardian and Grave Digger in Omaha: September 22, 2016

Last night, my wife and I attended the Blind Guardian concert in Omaha at the Waiting Room Lounge, a venue I have not previously been to.  Grave Digger was opening, so it was sure to be a fun night of German heavy metal.  The Waiting Room is a fairly small venue.  It is a bar that happens to have a stage area and a floor in front.  We found some seats at a table that had been moved to the back of the floor area.

Grave Digger was the first to take the stage and they played a blistering 45 minute set.  They are looking somewhat worse for wear, still dressing as they would have during the 1980's, but with graying and balding hair.  But they still sounded damn good.  I am not completely familiar with Grave Digger's catalogue, I only have one of their albums, but I did recognize one of the songs they played, which was my favorite off of the album I own, "Ballad of a Hangman".  Many of the other songs played had me convinced that I needed to check out more of their output.  Singer Chris Boltendahl was definitely charismatic and kept the crowd in it throughout the entire show.  All in all, it was a very impressive show for a band that has been around for more than three decades at this point.

Blind Guardian was up next, playing a track I had not heard before, though it would be the only one the entire show.  Afterwards, they played the enormously popular "Welcome to Dying", followed by the rollicking "Nightfall".  Blind Guardian has always had some rather unique lyrical themes for metal, and the next song "Fly" certainly qualified.  Only Blind Guardian can write a song about Peter Pan and make it sound metal as fuck.  After that, the band played the entirety of the album Imaginations from the Other Side, which was always my favorite of their albums.  They sounded just as good live as the album did, and that album is over 20 years old, which is incredible.  They closed the set after finishing up with the album, and then it was encore time and Blind Guardian delivered.  They started off with "Sacred Worlds", the best song off of their last album.  Later they performed the acoustic "Bard's Song-In the Forest" with the crowd singing along before closing the show out for real with "Mirror Mirror".  The band really did sound like they were 20 years younger, and singer Hansi Kursch still has the dynamic range that has become one of the key components of the band's sound.

This was my first time seeing a power metal band in concert.  Blind Guardian is of course one of the greatest power metal bands in history.  This was apparently their first concert in Nebraska, and the crowd was really involved.  Hopefully this will spread and more groups will make it over here.