The madness started on a Friday night and ended at the beginning of Sunday evening. Taake spread their sound in Roermond, Leeuwarden and Zaandam supported by the Dutch Cirith Gorgor and Winter of Sin. Having visited a close to perfect show on Friday at De Azijnfabriek in Roermond, I was eager to find out what the atmosphere would be like on Sunday at De Kade in Zaandam.

The venue was nicely packed with people, even though Winter of Sin already started playing around a quarter to five. This band from Groningen released their latest album Razernij earlier this year after changing vocalists. I must say that whenever you see Winter of Sin perform, you’ll always get your money’s worth. They give away a good show and even after two gigs in two days they were able to give all the energy they had left. The audience must have felt that after hesitating a little, because this supporting act evoked an ambiance that set the right tone for the rest of the afternoon.
 
Cirith Gorgor never has been able to catch my attention, although I had seen them perform twice before their gig in De Kade. Unfortunately something seemed to go wrong several times, as the drummer was obliged to stop in the middle of two songs. I’m not sure what caused the default, but I know that it must have been circumstantial since their gig in Roermond was technically great. I do have to hand it to Cirith Gorgor that they recovered pretty smoothly and the audience didn’t seem to mind the breaks all that much judging the intense reactions on the performance of ‘Der Untergang’.

And then, last but not least the headliner: Taake. It was pretty clear they enjoyed themselves during their weekend in Holland, since they didn’t exactly play their set flawless. Actually, compared to their gig in Roermond, it was kind of disappointing and that wasn’t due to the sound engineer. I’m not sure whether the audience was ignorant or just didn’t care at all about the quality, but the atmosphere was amazing. Or so it was, until after the last song when people in the audience realised Taake wasn’t coming back to give an encore. Piece of advice for the die-hard Taake fans; make sure you catch them in the early period of their tour because I’m under the impression by time they might get caught in a downward spiral.

Review by Karen Metselaar
Photos by Mira of Metalshots.com