(Pics: Lindsy Bouten)

I got familiar with the bands Ufomammut and Lento through their art-collective Malleus Rock Art Lab. This collective of painters and artists are present every year with their art at the Roadburn Festival. After I heard the amazing Ufomammut album Lucifers Songs, I had to buy everything of this amazing Italian band. Lento and Ufomammut also recorded a brilliant album as a collaboration with each other, so I was also curious if they would perform those songs live. When I found out they played a show in Holland, I didn’t hesitate for one minute to go to that show.

The band to kick off this heavy doom evening was Lento, previously unknown to me. This I regretted immediately, for their mixture of postcore, doom and stoner laid a relentless siege unto my ears. This was presented by three guitarists, a bassist and a monstrous drummer that bashed his drumkit to death while grooving like a maniac. The thickness and intensity of their sound really overwhelmed me and dragged me along through their set. Definitely one of the best Italian bands that I’ve ever encountered. I’d love to see these guys more often. If you dig stuff like Neurosis, Cult Of Luna, ISIS and stuff, this band is a must. Go check them out! (DemonDust)

After the great set of Lento, it was time for the dirty, smudgy doom sound of Ufomammut. Where Lento is slick, smooth and heavy, the Ufomammut sound is raw, dirty and filthy as hell! The first couple of songs the sound was terrible, the bass sound was way too loud. After a couple of songs the sound became better and you finally could hear what they were doing. Ufomammut is a three-piece that kicks out some really, heavy downtuned doom with a monstrous bass-sound. This combined with some spacey and atmospheric moog and synth effects.

Where Lento is a guitar-driven band, Ufomammut's sound is a bass-guitar dominated one. Especially the combination of ultra heavy, dirty doom and spacey synth effects makes this band unique. To increase that effect, they also had some backdrop animations and films of aliens, stars and space-ships. Unfortunately I didn’t hear any songs of the Lucifers Songs album. Instead, they played a lot of songs of their last album Idolum and a couple of their older album Snailking. 

After three quarters of the set Lorenze of Lento joined Ufomammut on additional guitars to play the song ‘Elephantom’. Immediately that gave the band a thicker and fuller sound and blew away the crowd with the massive volume they played it with. After that song, it really became interesting, because whole Lento joined Ufomammut on stage. What I hoped for happened at that moment. They played the whole collaboration album! So we witnessed a collaboration of two bands with four guitarists, a bassist, a moog-player and two drummers! As a three-piece they were already deafening, but as this eight piece they blew everything away. They played all three songs of that album, amazing stuff! After that, the crowd went bezerk and shouted for an encore. Ufomammut came back as a three-piece to play two more up-tempo doom songs. It was an amazing night with two great bands, which worked together perfectly. Can’t wait to see them again on next year's Roadburn Festival!  (RoyBalowski)