21-02-2010
Willemeen, Arnhem

Sunday, not the most usual day to visit a concert. So this particular sunday, we went to Arnhem to watch some black metal bands namely Dark Fortress, Serpent Cult, Farsot and Sardonis.

We arrived a little late so Sardonis was almost done with their show when we entered the Willemeen. First thing we noticed about this band that there were just two men on stage and no vocalist. Sardonis plays instrumental down tempo metal. It’s not really our kind of music but we have to say that it was very impressive to see just two men creating a wall of sound. If you like this kind of metal Sardonis is definatly a band you should check out. At the end of the show Sardonis played one song with guests vocalists from Farsot and Dark Fortress. There already was quite a lot of audience there and more people came later on the evening.

Farsot, a german black metal band were second to go on stage. At first Farsot seemed a little monotonous and the music seemed like very typical raw black metal to us. After listening to more songs our opinion changed. Farsot is a nice band with dynamic songs, and a lot of the visitors were here for exactly that.

Next in line was Serpent Cult from Belgium but we didn’t get to see a lot of this band because it was time to eat! We got to see some songs of this band when we got back. Serpent Cult plays nice music, if they would make instrumental songs. Their frontwoman’s voice (she is actually leaving the band after this tour) didn’t fit so well with the music which was a pity. After these bands, it was time to see Dark Fortress.

For some the band of the evening was Farsot, for us however, it was Dark Fortress. Dark Fortress recently released their new album Ylem and we were really looking forward to seeing a few of the new songs performed live. We weren’t disappointed, because they treated us to Ylem, Osiris, The Valley and Tabitha’s personal favourite Evenfall. The quality of the performance was excellent and the new songs were very convincing. From Eidolon, the songs The Silver Gate and Cohorror and -especially for the ladies- Baphomet were performed. As a treat and a pleasant surprise Dark Fortress played Pilgrim Of The Nightly Spheres from their debut-album Tales of Eternal Dusk. Frontman Morean was pleased to be able to speak Dutch to the audience, and as for us ladies, we were very pleased to have him on stage. Overall stage performance was splendid, because, although guitarist Asvargr failed to convince entirely, bass-player Draug and guitarist V Santura amply made up for this. On the whole, this evening in Arnhem was a great finale for Dark Fortress’ European tour, and we look forward to seeing many more shows by this remarkable band!

By: Laetitia & Tabitha