After attending my first South of Heaven event few weeks ago, I actually found out that the concerts are organised in Oslo under this title ever since 2003 (you can actually read a full history in Norwegian on their webpage http://www.southofheaven.no/ ), promoting smaller local more or less udnerground bands, together with bringing big names from the registry of 'mean and loud' metal, such as Kreator, Dark Tranquillity, Hatesphere, Ektomorf, Rotting Christ, Decapitated, Cannibal Corpse, Kreator ,Celtic Frost or Venom. Held in the same venue called Betong, belonging to the Norwegian Students association, this evening's event started in a blurry manner, more specifically with a lot of smoke on stage during soundcheck, smoke that triggered the fire alarm. So the few people who gathered there early had to go outside, together with the crew, wait for the firemen to show up, take a short tour in and then allow things to proceed as planned.
Hence after getting back inside, it only took few minutes until the first band, Helldealer, came on stage. It didn't look like a band with a long history of songs nor live performances, but instead they had a huge amount of energy and good mood which appealed to the crowd after the very first song. Their rock metal music is the kind suitable for any glass of beer one might drink or any type of headbanging you feel like doing. Especially when some of the lyrics consist of burps. It's good fun without having anything exceptional, but don't read that it is boring. Not live at least.
Up next another band from Norway, Wyruz, who switch the rhythm to a somewhat death/thrash sound, making you think of Metallica and Slayer influences. Their discography includes two demos and stuff for a new material so far, but since most of their concert was under the sign of technical problems with shorter or longer 'dead' moments between songs, any charm that their music might have got totally wasted. And these problems must have worn the guys down as well since the mood on stage was way less appealing that during the first band. So besides noticing the guitarist's attempt at some nice guitar solos, I wasn't too drawn by their music.
Headliners of the night was the Swedish Death'n'roll metal band Entombed, whose history goes back to 1987 and who, as far as I was told were the pioneers of "buzz saw" guitar sound. With his mixed look of a beggar and an old school metalhead, the frontman Lars-Goran Petrov manages to entertain the crowd with his vocal performance and continuous running around the stage and headbanging in every corner. But the main attraction is the bassist, Victor Brandt. He is a big guy and usually stayed in front of the stage doing windmills with his long hair, thus attracting most of the female crowd in the first rows. The guitarists did a good job at keeping the upbeat rhythm and filling in with some interesting riffs, yet they were mainly 'in the background'. The stage was mainly full of smoke, which was fit for the atmosphere but highly annoying for the photographing process. Due extreme tiredness I couldn't stay until the end of the set, but by the glimpses I got of the crowd, they seemed well entertained and enjoying the show they were offered by the loud show of the Swedes.