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The Agonist, Threat Signal, Mors Principium Est, Ferium, Dawn Heist - Certainly top 5 list material of 2013 live shows
How would one describe this Canadian band? As Metalcore? As Deathcore? As Melodic death metal? Why don’t we put all of those labels and maybe some more on The Agonist? Due to the huge reach Alissa has with her voice, from deep grunts to high clean, the band is able to make many perfect songs within many different genres. Therefore, the band had a huge variety in their support bands for this tour. Arsis had to cancel their gig, but was replaced by Mors Principium Est. Other supports were Dawn Heist, Ferium and Threat Signal.

Although
 Ferium would open according to the time schedule, the opening band this evening was Dawn Heist. This is a band from Down Under and they make what they call electronic, melodic/groove metal. I could only see about three songs, because the band had a short performance and I walked in about ten minutes too late. Nevertheless, this was enough to convince me, and the crowd looked like it was convinced as well: many heads were banging. Although this band only released their debut single in 2011, they showed a mature image and they already know how to (re)act on stage.

The second band was the Israeli death metal band Ferium. This was their first show in Holland and they showed the crowd that they are already ready for a headline show in this country. They got the crowd going in no-time, including some movement. Although the band has five members, only four of them were on stage tonight. The weird thing was that
 their bass-player was the missing band member, and he wasn’t even missed. The guitars were tuned low and only when you listened very closely you could hear the lack of bass. Nevertheless, this band impressed me a lot and I can’t wait until they come back.

Mors Principium Est makes melodic death metal and they play quite well live as well. However, these vocals didn’t really cut it for me. They played very steady and it was nice to hear until the vocalist started singing. Not my cup of tea, so I went out to get some fresh air.

The last band prior to the headliner was Threat Signal. This band has also been labelled as melodic death metal, but they are influenced by thrash metal and groove metal. They raised the level of energy of the evening,
 got the crowd moving a lot and even got some people singing along. This Canadian band showed that they know how to perform for a crowd like this and asked for movement at the right times. They also performed quite steady and although they broke some of their instruments, they had a lot of fun and just kept going. The sound, on the other hand, wasn’t at its best, but that was an issue for almost all the bands. I wonder how long it will take for this band to play more in Europe, because I see a lot of perspective for this band.

Finally it was time for the headliner of this tour, The Agonist. Although this band released their last album in June 2012, this was the first time they toured in The Netherlands since then. One of the reasons for this was that vocalist Alissa was touring with Kamelot to perform the song she featured on their last cd. But now they were finally here and they showed that it was worth the wait. The band was very tight and Alissa’s vocals were spot-on. It didn’t matter if she growled or sang clean, but it was like an even better version of the album. There was a mosh pit during almost every song and the energy of both the crowd and the band was superb. They had many instrumental problems, for example one of the guitars wasn’t audible for one or two songs. But still, the band showed that they know how to play live: steady and with a little bit of a show element. Not only Alissa was eye-catching, the other band members also attracted a lot of attention by their awesome performance. Songs from the last album, Prisoners, like “You’re Coming With Me”, “The Escape” and “Panaphobia” were mixed with older songs such as “Martyr Art”, “Thank You, Pain” and “Born Dead: Buried Alive".
  They only played 12 songs before they left the stage, but this show was definitely worth the travelling.

I’m quite sure this show will be in the top 5 list of 2013 for many people, it will definitely be in mine. For those who live in Holland and missed this show: the tour will also cross the Waves of Metal Fest in Hoogeveen on October 19
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