The first band up was Battalion, a thrash/death metal act from (as all the other bands here tonight) Belgium. Unfortunately all the bands got to play for 45 minutes tonight, and they all got to do an encore which is not a smart thing to do, because obviously this band was just the opening act and obviously there were better things to come. The sound was quite poor, especially the drums sounded bad (and not tight, especially with the fast double bass parts). The riffs they played had nothing refreshing about them, the only parts that were enjoyable to me were the breakdowns. Add a one-sided vocalist with just one sound and some way too tight jeans on and you can guess that I was relieved when this was over.

 

Axamenta was up next, and the sound was surprisingly better. Excellent I can’t say, but definitely better. Also the drummer appeared to blast out a second set this night, but this time he proved to be smarter by using a click-track, which enhanced his tightness tremendously. Therefore I find it ridiculous that he doesn’t use this device with Battalion as well. Maybe he doesn’t take that band serious enough. Axamenta proved to be a whole lot more entertaining with their combination of thrash, black and death metal. Also the vocalist managed to squeeze out some different sounds, varying from high to low, adding to the variation of the total sound of the band. All in all I still wasn’t that impressed with this band, but it was far more enjoyable than the one before.

The moment I had been waiting for, the moment I travelled to Eindhoven for in the first place; In-Quest. Since my first encounter with them I liked their shit, and that still hasn’t changed. And although there wasn’t that much of an audience and the sound was still under average and they had a very small stage at their disposal, they fucking rocked. We were treated to some heavy-as-fuck rhythmical thrash/deathcore, comprised of two older tracks I didn’t know, quite some material from The Comatose Quandaries, which is an excellent album for anybody into rhythmical groove metal, and a cover of Meshuggah’s ‘Corridor Of Chameleons’. Their performance was highly entertaining, probably not flawless, especially not after vocalist Miqe took a hit of our joint. What the hell, I banged my head, got fucking wasted almost to a point of no return and I still love this freaking band. Brutal shit to please any metalhead’s trouser snake anytime.