| RAGE + GB ARTS |
April 29, 2001 |
MADRID |
At Sunday the 29th of April, Rage had their
third gig of three on their spanish tour. The gig took place at The Revolver Club.
I entered the place around 8:25 and the music started playing (HammerFall's "Renegade" album)
At that time there were around 200-300 people there, but in the following half hour
before the start of the gig this number grew significally. One of the opening acts
(Vicious Rumors) was cancelled.
At 8:40 PM the first band started playing:
GB ARTS, a German Progressive Power Metal band.
It was a band totally unknown to me. I've never heard any of their albums but
I have to admit they were pretty good. They were presenting their latest album called
"The Lake" (produced by Victor Smolski) on which the band were supported by Rage
musicians Peavy Wagner, Victor Smolski and Mike Terrana as well as Angel Dust vocalist
Dirk Thurisch and former Mind Odyssey keyboarder Andreas Dirksmeier. Their guitarist
(André Rasfeld) and their new singer (Markus Brand) are very very good! A song titled
"The Chosen One" was the highlight of their perfomance. All
the musicians compliment each other perfectly. This was a good show by a bunch of
very talented musicians, who formed a tight unit. Too bad their show lasted
only just 30 minutes :-(
After a short break the intro from "Welcome To The Other Side" as well as a
spoken intro filled the venue. RAGE
entered the stage at exactly 9:30 and opened with the fast "Paint The Devil On The Wall".
The audience was ecstatic and they had all rights to be. The sound and the perfomance
were brilliant, and this was only the start! :-) They went straight into "The Mirror
In Your Eyes" after. It was followed by "Back In Time" from the album "Ghosts"
(on CD it's wonderful, but experiencing this live was sheer magic) and "Solitary Man"
from "Trapped". The band played very tight and the crowd reaction was very enthusiastic.
After a while they played a song that live was pretty cool. I'm talking about "One More Time".
"I'm Crucified" contained a splendid guitar solo by Victor Smolski. Mr Smolski did it
pretty good. This guy is king of the guitar... it was so cool to watch him! After a while,
the concert entered a much-needed mellow phase, for the audience to catch their breath :)
with the ballad "Deep In The Night". After "Riders On The Moonlight", it was then time to
speed things up again, starting with the great "Sent By The Devil" (from "Black In Mind"),
one of the highlights of the set (this song seems to be an audience favorite) and the
monumental "Firestorm" (from "The Missing Link") The crowd was going nuts! Then it was
time for the drum solo, of course. Terrana presented us a drum solo I don't even have
the words to describe. He was in a brilliant playing mood this night, just like the rest
of the band. Just when I thought he was playing as fast as a man possibly can, he simply
started to play even faster... just amazing! (Peavy shouted: "drums killer!!!!" :-)
You need to see this yourself.
Then it was time for two more songs from "WTTOS": "Straight To Hell" and "Sister Demon". Another highlight of the night was their all
time masterpiece "Higher Than The Sky". This was absolutely a crowd favourite because
everybody in the audience joined singing the lyrics and having fun and we also tested our
screaming abilities :-) After this great song the band left the stage and it seemed
the audience wanted to hear more (what else did you expect?). Peavy and Co. returned on
stage to play "From The Cradle To The Grave" (from the album "XIII")... holy shit...
it was incredible... WOW... and a very heavy "Don't Fear The Winter". The crowd went
crazy and gave a loud applause. After that the band left the stage and a wonderful night came
to its end. All in all their perfomance lasted 2 wonderful hours and it was GREAT! Nothing compares to the energy and amazing power of vocalist/bassist
Peavy Wagner who, by the way, is a kind and funny guy... and guitarist Victor Smolski &
drummer Mike Terrana have musical talent beyond compare. These 3 put on an unforgetable concert! -Review & photos by Marina-
| RAGE SET-LIST |
Paint The Devil On The Wall,
The Mirror In Your Eyes, Back In Time, Solitary Man, R.I.P, One More Time, Requiem,
I'm Crucified, Turn The Page, Days Of December, Deep In The Night, Lunatic,
Riders On The Moonlight, Sent By The Devil, Firestorm, Straight To Hell, Sister Demon,
Higher Than The Sky, From The Cradle To The Grave, Don't Fear The Winter.
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