Last Saturday, March 30, ‘Thrashtastic’ took place at DVG Club in Kortrijk. As the name suggests, the event was an ode to thrash metal. For only €20 (in pre-sale) you could heartily headbang, mosh, and crowd surf to no less than 7 bands. There were supposed to be 8, but Severdhed had to cancel a few days in advance. The West-Flemish Death Fury brings, as the name suggests, a combination of death and thrash metal. A lot of people were already present for this opener, and they smoothly got the audience involved. The sound was quite well adjusted, but here and there some feedback came through, something that unfortunately continued throughout the day. With ‘Evil Dead’ as an ode to Chuck Schuldinger, a gear was shifted up. Although the intro had to be played 2x after a technical issue, the audience was well engaged. Soon after, under the instruction “tmeug wel e bitje beweging in komn wi” (you may well add a bit of movement, you know), the first mosh pit took place.
The Antwerp Axident was next to heat up DVG Club by a few degrees. The quartet hasn’t released an LP yet but still managed to fill a set with their own material. Although there was slightly less movement than with their predecessor, they managed to captivate me with their songs. Especially closing with Panzer Attack thrashed away smoothly.
World Decay, a five-member ensemble from the distant Limburg, brought a more technical side of thrash metal. Although the vocals sometimes leaned more towards death metal, World Decay surely pleased me and the rest of DVG Club. Especially frontman Ben Vervoort not only provided the vocals but also played the audience, as a good frontman should. World Decay will release their first LP in May and will definitely be reviewed here.
The Turnhout-based Objector has been part of the Belgian metal scene for a bit longer. Their latest material, ‘Social Intolerance’, dates back to 2018. The experience also showed on stage. Especially guitarist, vocalist, and frontman Bock played and screamed the roof off. After some encouragement, the mosh pit here also got going well. The pace was particularly high, which unfortunately made not all notes and riffs clearly audible. I solved this by making use of their more than reasonably priced merch, where you could grab a shirt, demo CD, full-length CD, and some goodies for €25.
The West-Flemish Cobracide had a home game ahead. I had already seen them in action last year as a supporting act for the Italian Hellcrash and just like then, I was particularly impressed with what these gentlemen serve up. A good dose of old-school thrash metal with a hint of death metal woven through. Besides the mosh pits, the audience could appreciate a wall of death, after which the headbanging violence continued smoothly. Unfortunately, the set was somewhat prematurely cut short due to a technical problem with the guitar. They are already set to return to the stage in Ostend at Huggins Awakening Fest in May (together with Death Fury, Axident, and World Decay) and a mini-tour with the American Mind Wars follows in the fall.
Time for the international bands. Although I had the impression that the crowd had increased throughout the evening, it seemed with Rezet as if the retreat had already been sounded for some. The Germans have been a band for 20 years and have 5 albums to their name, although frontman and guitarist Richard Wagner is the only remaining original member. Although the Germans were energetic on stage, with enthusiasm (especially bassist Lorenz Kandolf, also from Traitor), the audience remained quite quiet and calm. The first songs were an auditory hodgepodge where especially the guitar struggled to make its mark, and although it balanced out a bit better after that, Rezet didn’t completely convince me.
The headliner of the day is the Irish Gama Bomb. Led by the charismatic Philly Byrne, they bring thrash with a solid nod to action movies from the ’80s. This tour was in honor of their eighth album ‘Bats’, although only four songs from it were played. Also, mascot Snowy (the gamabombinable snowman) was present to provide the audience with a few sips of beer. They delivered their set in a tight manner and are clearly a well-oiled thrash machine, which, even on the last day of their tour, had energy to spare.
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