For the third time in a week, I returned to Kansas City. This time I brought along some friends so the drive wasn’t so bad as they definitely knew how to keep a lively conversation going. After arriving and checking into our hotel, we arrived at the Riot Room with a lot more time to spare that we thought. When we first arrived I was a worried this would be like the Cryptopsy show on Thursday, where the lineup was insane and the turnout was garbage. What I forgot about was that on the other side of the venue was another line for the Gorguts entrance that must have had a much bigger line. Regardless, after the Cryptopsy show, I knew I wouldn’t be bothered by the turnout of the crowd because I knew these bands would put on absolutely killer shows.
Marasmus was up first on the inside stage and as people trickled in things began to ramp up. The vocalist was walking around in the crowd getting people hyped up, which is always cool to see, even though I’m sure it was partly just due to the fact that there was hardly any room on the stage. They did a good job of getting heads bobbing early in the day which can often be a tough job as people walk in stiff and sober.
Ahtme was on outside and I managed to catch a few tracks off their set. I was pleasantly surprised to see the outdoor area much more full than the indoor area, despite it being hot and sticky outside. The crowd response was equally as good outdoors, if not a little better. It was definitely a good start to the day.
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This is where things started to get a little goofy. If I remember right, a few bands were still running behind, so they were forced to go out-of-order. Some old friends from Wisconsin were up next, the mighty Micawber. These guys always put on an awesome show and it was great to get to see them live again with new material that blew me away. Still, as they were playing, people on the inside were still trickling in. During their set I missed Abjure unfortunately which wouldn’t be the first set of the night. There was so much metal to pack into one night, it was almost impossible to catch everything, but what can you do?
The real kicker came when Internal Bleeding came up at the exact same time as Gorguts. For most of the crowd, it seemed like an easy decision as they all filed out the door to see Gorguts. Most of the night had been staggering a little bit, but since there had been a few delays they couldn’t push it back any further, so they had to play at the same time. I felt bad as apparently even Internal Bleeding wanted to see Gorguts and didn’t have the crowd they deserved.
Gorguts set was absolutely wild. Until this weekend, I’ve never walked away from a set feeling like I learned something new about playing guitar and bass. Between Cryptopsy, Rivers of Nihil, and finally Gorguts, I feel like I just got the music lessons of a lifetime in a weekend. Between Luc Lemay and Kevin Hufnagel I had no idea where to look as their hands were just mad blurs on their respective guitars. They played tracks from all their albums, opening with ‘Stiff and Cold’ then playing classics like ‘Obscura,’ ‘Orphans of Sickness,’ one of my favorites, ‘Inverted,’ and then newer tracks off of Colored Sands.
By the time Vader came up, we were well behind schedule, but at that point no one gave much thought to it. The crowd was well pumped up after a stellar performance by Gorguts and from what I was told Internal Bleeding crushed it as well. Vader blew the doors off the venue with ‘Wings’ as they took off and didn’t look back. Their set was fast, relentless, and perfectly coordinated. It was clear these guys had been doing this for a very long time and still loved every second of what they do. They covered a lot of hits, then went back to Welcome To The Morbid Reich as it was the 25th Anniversary. If you want the full scoop on the set list, listen in to the interview I did with James. During Vader’s set, the crowd went absolutely wild. The pit opened up into the most violent moshing I’d seen all week, people were hanging off the ceiling support beams, it was pretty great. Finishing up with a big finale on a cover of Slayer’s ‘Reign In Blood’ really brought things to a beautiful close. The crowd ate it up and went crazy.
All in all, this couldn’t have been a cooler show. I think I got extremely lucky to catch two amazing tours crossing paths at the same time and I know the chances of that happening again are highly unlikely, so I tried to enjoy myself as much as possible. This time around, Kansas City actually showed up to the show and came to party so the vibe was much better all around. All of the bands that I caught crushed it, and from what I heard, all the ones I missed did excellent too. This was definitely an incredible weekend and one for the books.