KREATOR / SEPULTURA - Klash Of The Titans Invades Montreal!

August 18, 2023, a year ago

Photos: Thomas Mazerolles | Words: Albert Lamoureux

gallery heavy metal kreator sepultura

Kreator and Sepultura were co-headlining what is called the Klash Of The Titans tour that also includes Death Angel and Spiritworld as opening acts. This was the perfect event to spend at the Olympia Theatre on a Friday night in Montreal.

With four bands on the bill, doors were early and people were still getting in the venue when Spiritworld started their set. Directly of out Las Vegas, Spiritworld was playing in Montreal for the second time and we could see that some fans knew what to expect from these cowboys. Their mix of thrash, death and hardcore music is heavy and fast. The band members are pretty dynamic on stage and signer Stu Folsom got the crowd going pretty quickly. For this show, the band dug equally in both of their albums and fans were very happy to experience what Spiritworld is all about.

It did not take long for Death Angel to get on stage and obliterated the fans with the song "Lord Of Hate". They started to push each other instantly to the pleasure of the musicians. Classics like ‘Voracious Souls’ added fuel to the fire and we started seeing crowd surfers as well as a bigger and more energetic mosh pit. As usual, Mark Osegueda is very charismatic and interacts with the fans continuously. His high-pitched screams were not only powerful, but simply out of this world. The succession of "The Dream Calls For Blood", "The Moth" and "Humanicide" was totally insane and the crowd loved every second of it. Their short set (too short for my taste) ended up with the medley consisting of "The Ultra-Violence" and "Thrown To The Wolves". No matter if Death Angel is headlining of opening for another band, their show is always awesome and this performance did not disappoint.

After a little while, Sepultura was back in Montreal barely one year after their last time in the city. Just like the last time, the band only had a few cabs on each side of Eloy’s drum kit. Fans were already screaming the band’s name as the song "Polícia’" from the band Titãs started playing as their introduction. Still promoting their Quadra release from 2020, they opened their set with the song "Isolation". The band followed with ‘Territory’, a crowd favourite that made fans push each other with even more passion. Sepultura opted to play five songs from their last album, and played all of them in the first half of their set while keeping their older hits for the second half of their show. 

"Kairos" and "Propaganda" were welcomed by fans that were keeping the security guards busy with their crowd-surfing. When Sepultura is playing their older songs, I must admit that I always feel like their guitar sound is too thin and is lacking a second guitar player to accompany Andreas. But that did not bother the fans that were going crazy to riffs of "Refuse/Resist" and "Arise". The band came back on stage with their usual set closer, but fans never get tired of hearing "Ratamahatta" and "Roots Bloody Roots"! Even if this was a more condensed version of their performance of last year, fans loved every second of Sepultura’s show.

Kreator was the headlining band for this second to last show of the tour and the fans were all fired up when they heard the ‘Sergio Corbucci Is Dead’ introduction. That was before being crushed with the brutal "Hate Über Alles". Surprisingly, this would be the only song played from their last release of the same name. That being said, the band played a selection of hits that would please any Kreator fans. The song "Betrayer" had not been played in Montreal in ages and was a delight to hear after all this time. We all know the love that exists between this city and Kreator. Mille Petrozza reminded the fans how much playing hear means to them during one of his many interactions with the crowd. He also reminded the fans that when they played in this city, it was in seated venue where fans could not thrash. So tonight, his message was simple, thrash, crowd surf, make circle pits and walls of deaths, as expected, fans were more than happy to do as they were told. I must say that even if Mille was all fired up, he seemed a little tired, this is understandable as they were ending a long tour, but that did not stop him for giving his all. 

This stage design included a giant inflatable devil behind the drum (taken from the artwork or their latest album) and it was very nice touch, but the lack of front lights made it difficult to see the musicians in the smoke. I understand that they went for the dark vibe to accompany their music, but more lighting would have been nice for the fans that were watching the show instead of pushing each other in the mosh pit. It was also very pleasant to hear the song "666 - World Divided" and it was chilling to hear the powerful roar of fans yelled the ‘6 6 6’ chorus in unison. As usual, the band kept their biggest hits for the end and pulverized the fans with the succession of ‘"Flag Of Hate", "Violent Revolution" and "Pleasure To Kill".

As expected, the night was a huge success and fans would have taken more song from all the bands that played tonight, even if the feeling of exhaustion was clearly visible on their faces!

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