2009 Rockstar Energy Drink Mayhem Festival
This was the second year for the Rockstar Mayhem Fest. Mayhem Fest is an annual touring metal festival. Last year's fest was insane with groups such as Slipknot, Disturbed, Five Finger Death Punch, Mastodon, Airbourne, and many other bands. You can check out my review of last year's show here.
This year's show lineup seemed to be just as good as last years with bands such as Killswitch Engage, Trivium, Bullet for my Valentine, Behemoth, All That Remains, and Job for a Cowboy. On top of this already awesome lineup, they have Slayer and Marilyn Manson as the headliners.
We got a chance to interview a few band members. You can check out the Trivium interview with Paolo here, The Black Dahlia Murder interview with Shannon and Ryan here, the Bullet for my Valentine interview with the drummer, Moose, here, and finally the interview with one of the drummer Gods, Slayer's Dave Lombardo here.
One of the awesome things about this tour is the way that they set up the 2nd and Jaeger stages. Both stages are side by side, and as soon as one band finishes up their set, the next band starts on the stage next store. This way the music is pretty much nonstop.
One of the other great things about Mayhem Fest is it's all metal. So you don't have any bands that just stick out like a sore thumb (like a Ska band at Wednesday 13, or Coheed and Cambria with Slipknot). But if you aren't really into the harder stuff, then this may not be the tour for you.
It was a great day for a show, partly cloudy and, at least at first, it wasn't too hot. Out of all of the 2nd and Jaeger stage bands, I would have to say that Trivium, All That Remains, Behemoth, God Forbid, and The Black Dahlia Murder had the best performances of the day on the side stages.
The Black Dahlia Murder is a band that I hadn't seen before this show, so I had no idea what to expect of them. They had a Cradle of Filth meets Bullet for my Valentine sound to them. Their singer, Trevor did an awesome job at getting the crowd pumped up, even though it was already getting hot as hell in Atlanta. I still wonder how Trevor is able to sing the way he does every day, and still have a voice to talk with afterwards. Their guitar and bass players did an amazing job with their instruments on stage. And they were fun to watch which just makes things even better. This is a band that I'm looking forward to seeing again when they come to Nashville in October, so keep an eye out for a review of their show at Rocket Town near the end of October.
God Forbid is another amazing act from the show. Their lead vocalist, Byron, has an amazing aura of energy around him that the crowd feeds off of. He is capable of not only have the screaming and growling that most metal bands have, he's also able to carry a tune with some more melodic vocals when it comes time to sing them. And to make the show even more special, it was Byron's birthday. Dallas and Doc, the guitar players did a great job on stage, and have an awesome precision to their sound. Overall the band kicked ass on stage and I'd love to catch their show again.
This was the second time that we had seen All That Remains, the first time being at Rock on the Range in Columbus Ohio earlier in the year. I enjoyed their performance in Ohio, but I think they did an even better job in Atlanta. There is no other way to describe their performance other than fucking amazing. Their lead singer, Phil Labonte, is awesome. He reminds me of Ivan Moddy of Five Finger Death Punch in that he can transition from screaming and growling to having a softer more melodic sound that looks and sounds almost effortless. Oli, their lead guitar player is extraordinarily talented, and his guitar just looks great with the wood-like finish. Their rhythm guitar player, Mike Martin, also does a fantastic job on the guitar, and together Oli and Mike make one hell of a guitar duo. Jeanne Sagan, the bass player, is excellent at what she does, and shows that a women have a place in the metal world other than just to be in the back, looking pretty. And to top off the band, their drummer, Jason Costa, does amazing things with the double bass. Live, this band easily makes it into my top ten favorite bands to see live. If you like All That Remains' sound on CD, then you are going to love their performance. They sound a lot like they do on CD, plus Phil and the rest of the band know how to get the crowd pumped, and seem to feed off of the crowd to make their performance just that much better.
Behemoth, like Black Dahlia Murders, is a band that I had heard of before, but other than the name I didn't know anything about them at all. When they came out, the crowd went insane. The band members came out looking like something out of someone's nightmare. Their sound was a little different than the other bands that I've talked about so far. The vocals were more growls than screaming, basically they sounded a lot like the Dethlok on Metalocalypse. They did a great job at keeping the crowd going, even though the crowd has been going nonstop for hours in the hot, Atlanta sun. They just had a stage presence and charisma that kept you going, even if you felt like you were about to pass out from dehydration. If you are into Dethlok then this band is definitely worth checking out, and even if you aren't they are a band that is definitely worth checking out live.
Trivium is a band that I've listened to a lot, and I saw them earlier this year with Slipknot in Nashville, TN, but this time we got a chance to get up close and personal with the band's performance. They have one hell of a stage performance and two distinctive sounds. Trivium has two very distinctive types of songs. A lot of their older stuff has a lot of screaming in it like most of the other bands on this tour, and then their newer sound seems to have a lot of Metallica influence, in fact their newer stuff is what Metallica should sound like now. On stage, they do amazing things with the crowd, making sure that they go crazy. Trivium makes full use of the stage, and any other things near the stage they can get to. Their bass player, Paolo, is especially great with the crowd, taking his bass out into the crowd. Matt Heafy, their lead vocalist/guitarist has an awesome voice. Corey Beaulieu, the other guitarist, is one hell of a guitar player. And Travis Smith, the drummer, is an awesome drummer, he has some tremendous skill. This is one band that definitely loves to put on a great show just to see how the crowd reacts to them. Out of all of the 2nd and Jaeger stage bands, Trivium was definitely the best edging out All That Remains.
Even though I only went into detail with five of the 2nd and Jaeger stage bands, every single band played their asses off for the crowd, and did an awesome job. Not only the bands, but the stage crews did a great job at making sure the soundchecks were good even with a band playing on the stage next to them, and they had everything set up in time to keep the music going constantly all day. But after busting their asses all day, it was time for the side stages to call it a night and for the main stage bands, Bullet for my Valentine, Killswitch Engage, Slayer, and Marilyn Manson to show Atlanta what they have.
The first band to take the main stage was Bullet for my Valentine. I liked their album Scream Aim Fire, so I was excited to check out this band. They performed a lot of their songs off of Scream Aim Fire to a great crowd. They sounded just as good as they sound on CD. Matt, their lead singer, has a great voice and he's good with the guitar also. Padge's guitar skills and Jay's bass skills are amazing, while Moose's drum work rounds off this band's sound with some great beats. They did a wonderful job at keeping the crowd pumped for themselves, and pumping up the crowd even more for the bands that were coming up after Bullet.
The next band was Killswitch Engage. I had seen some of their live videos and heard a few live audio tracks of their, and from that I knew that this band was going to be great at Mayhem Fest. Even though I had seen and heard their live stuff, it still wasn't nearly as good as experiencing Killswitch live. This was the first band to really make use of stage props. They had a lot of LED panels behind them, came out in their sleeveless tuxedos, and they were the first band to use fire in their show. Even though they had their props, fire, and bright lights, they didn't let those distract the fans from the performance. Their lead vocalist, Howard Jones not only has amazing vocal talent, but his stage charisma was incredible. I think their drummer, Justin Foley, was the only drummer on the tour not using a double bass, but even without the double bass his drumming was intense, and he did a great job. If I hadn't seen he wasn't using a double bass I wouldn't have known. Guitarists Joel and Adam both did an amazing job at playing their guitars, together they sounded great. The only real problem I had with the set was Adam running around in a cape looking like he wants to be Angus from AC/DC. It was cool at first but got old. Killswitch played a lot of their popular songs. Their cover of Dio's "Holy Diver" was my favorite song from their set, which I think their version of it was better than the original anyways. Overall I their performance was the best of the night so far, they sounded amazing, they were entertaining to watch, and fed off of the crowd's energy.
Next up was one of the all time bands ever to grace the metal scene with their presence, Slayer. Well, if you don't know who Slayer is, then you aren't a real metal fan. Even country music fans know of Slayer. They've been doing their thing since 28 years (1981 is when they started) and they haven't slowed down. You could tell who came to the show for Slayer, as they were the fans that were the loudest. The first thing that I noticed about the band is that they didn't look like they had been doing this for nearly thirty years. I was half expecting at least one of them to resemble Steven Tyler, but I'm glad to see that that expectation didn't come true. The band didn't use fire, they didn't use props, they just came out and did what they did best, play their asses off. After nearly thirty years, I would have thought that vocalist Tom Araya's voice would have been showing some wear and tear, but he sounded great. Dave Lombardo, one of the drumming gods, didn't miss a beat with this fast paced beats. Kerry King, and Jeff Hanneman also played their asses off to a crowd that absolutely loved them. They did amazing things with their guitars that I think some of your other great guitar players may have problems with. I would have to say, that out of the "Big Four" thrash metal bands (Slayer, Metallica, Anthrax, and Megadeth), Slayer is the one that seems to have stuck to its guns the longest. Even though they were not my favorite performance of the night, it was truly amazing to see Slayer perform live. Marilyn Manson
The final performance of the night I was a little nervous about. I've heard that Marilyn Manson puts on a great show, and then I've heard stories about him putting on extremely bad shows due to being drunk. And since I'm not as big of a fan of his last two albums, Eat Me, Drink Me, and The High End of Low, I was a little iffy on if I would enjoy his performance. Waiting on him to come out reminded me a lot last year of waiting on Slipknot to come out. It was my first time to see either band live, and I couldn't wait to see how they performed. The first thing I can say about Manson's singing live, he sounds like he does on CD. He mainly performed his older stuff and threw in one of his newer songs, "Arma-goddamn-motherfucking-geddon" which is by far the best song on his new album. He frequently added or took something away from his wardrobe between songs, but by doing this it just added something more to his performance, making it just that much better. He ended up doing most of his big hits like "Sweet Dreams", "Beautiful People", and, "I don't like the Drugs". The only thing is that I wish he could have stayed on stage even longer. Marilyn Manson, hands down, was the best performance of the night.
Overall the show was a huge success. Tons of great music, thousands upon thousands of dedicated fans, and I couldn't have asked for more. I will say that this tour is every bit as good as Rock on the Range this year, and it was on par with last year's Mayhem Festival. I hope the tradition keeps going because I plan on catching Mayhem Fest every year. See you next year.
We would like to thank Greg, Amanda, all of the bands, the crew, security, and the fans that attended the show for helping make this such a great night.
