SLAYER / LAMB OF GOD / ANTHRAX / OBITUARY | LIVE REVIEW
Motorpoint Arena Cardiff, Mon 5 Nov
It’s Bonfire Night, this air is thick with smoke and the sky is alight in eerie red and green. It’s an almost perfect setting for the final Welsh visit of thrash titans Slayer [above] as they bring their near four-decade career to an end with one final run of shows. They’ve also brought a stellar supporting cast with them, making this the must-see metal show of 2018.
The arena is already three-quarters full as Florida death metal pioneers Obituary kick off the four-band bill at 6.20pm and proceed to level Cardiff with their low-end death metal groove. A blistering seven-song set includes Don’t Care and Redneck Stomp before closing with Slowly We Rot – absolutely brutal. What is already apparent, though, is the legendarily terrible sound at the Motorpoint Arena. Unless you are front and centre, you’re getting shortchanged, but a short place switch later it’s the turn of NYC thrash metal veterans Anthrax [below].
I’m not sure if it’s meant to be a tribute to fallen comrades Dimebag and Vinnie Paul, but in a strange move the band choose to bookend their set with the opening/closing riffs to Pantera’s Cowboys From Hell. The Cardiff crowd lap this up and respond with some serious circle pits. Another short set sees the band playing selected favourites from their massive back catalogue, with Caught In A Mosh, Be All, End All and Antisocial greeted like old friends as Scott Ian stomps his way around the stage. They finish up with Indians, although it’s interrupted during the incendiary “WARDANCE!” cry by drummer Charlie Benante, who spots some overzealous action in the pit.
By now the Motorpoint Arena is stuffed to capacity and energy levels have dipped somewhat after Anthrax, but Lamb Of God [below] take to the stage, looking to reinvigorate the masses. The youngest band on the bill, the five-piece tear into their set with Omerta as vocalist Randy Blythe runs around the stage in a whirlwind of dreadlocks. Part of the New Wave Of American Heavy Metal that emerged in the early noughties, the band’s popularity has seemingly never waned, which I honestly don’t understand. They are brutal, yes, but for me those alarm-clock riffs offer little in the way of variety. They hammer through the likes of 512 and Engage The Fear Machine before closing their set with crowd favourite Redneck. The crowd seem happy, if eager to get to the main event.
There’s a tinge of sadness as the massive curtain drops and Slayer take to the stage, knowing that this is the final chance to see them, but as a last hurrah, they don’t disappoint. The set takes time to get into gear, with Repentless, Blood Red and Disciple all received warmly – and I mean that literally. No expense has been spared with the pyro for this tour and I wonder how the band have any eyebrows left.
The first batch of Slayer classics are rolled out, Mandatory Suicide and War Ensemble, for which Tom Araya encourages the second “WAR!” cry of the night, but it’s from Seasons In The Abyss when the crowd really get going. Guitarists Kerry King and Gary Holt trade riffs in the unsettling Dead Skin Mask, while Hell Awaits threatens to engulf drummer Paul Bostaph in flames as the stage resembles the pits of Hades itself.
A ferocious Dittohead, from 1994’s Divine Intervention, follows and before you know it the end is in sight with the some of the greatest set-closers in metal history all played back to back. South Of Heaven, Reign In Blood and Angel Of Death are all played in front of a banner paying tribute to Slayer’s late, great guitarist Jeff Hanneman, taking the crowd to the brink of metal ecstasy.
words CHRIS ANDREWS photos JASPER WILKINS
