Gillian managed to make it to this gig, along with Jon and Debbie who went the whole hog and dressed up appropriately for the kings of Pirate Metal, Alestorm.
[Full sets of pics in these three sets: Darkest Era / Claim the Throne / Alestorm]
Before they took to the stage, though, there were two support bands. First up were Darkest Era who were OK if nothing special. They got the crowd warmed up, certainly, and knew their way around a stage.
Claim the Throne were next up and brought their Australian sense of humour with them to have the audience punching the air and moshing in readiness for the headliners. Credit to them for admitting they come from a small rip-off of the real Perth over on the east of this country. Had I a fiver in my wallet by the end of the gig, I’d have picked up one of their CDs.
Act of the evening, though, was Alestorm. “We are Alestorm! From… just down the road!” was the opening cry as the hometown gig kicked off in fine style. Material old and new flowed as smoothly as the Buckfast which lead singer Christopher Bowes refused to down in one, giving the excuse that he was far too skinny and “would die”.
Circle pits, walls of death and “grab your partner” dances ensued. All were accompanied by a significant amount of crowdsurfing, including an impressive dive by the aforementioned front man at the end of their set. I’d say there was a slight bias towards music from the current album, Back Through Time, which was fine with me as it’s full of great material. One of the top numbers of the night, though, was instrumental “No Quarter” (nothing to do with the Led Zep song of the same name).
As ever, a shame the Garage has an early curfew as the band could easily have played for an extra half hour to an energetic and appreciative crowd.
Another good gig, making this a really enjoyable couple of weeks. Next up is Shinedown on Thursday and I’m toying with adding tickets for Tygers of Pan Tang, Paradise Lost and Deathstars to the pile…
