Machine Head
Through the Ashes of
Europe Tour
December 9, 2003
Copenhagen, Denmark
By: Anders Sandvall
Rob and the other Machine Head guys have been on tour and played all throughout
Europe. Yesterday they did their first show on Scandinavian ground before
heading out to the other Scandinavian cities. After the Scandinavian shows, there are
only five shows left to do in Europe and then the tour ends on December
19th 2003.
When I met them earlier during the day they looked pretty tired, except for the new
guitarist Phil who didn’t make the interview at all.
Machine Head went on as scheduled and delivered a powerful and aggressive outburst that lasted
for about 90 minutes. The crowd in Pumpehuset tagged along instantly and it was nearly
sold out. Machine Head are currently supporting their new album, “Through the Ashes
of Empires,” which was released about a month ago in Europe. In my opinion, they are
headed back to their roots with this album. The band started out with “Imperium”
from the new record, and for once they played a lot of new songs from their new album. Of
course, it was a blend of both older and newer songs but the new material took the biggest
place. Some of the songs were, “Left Unfinished”, “In the Presence of my
Enemies” and older stuff like “The Burning Red,” “The Blood, the
Sweat, the Tears,” and “Ten Ton Hammer.” All of the songs were performed in
very vital and aggressive versions, just like they sounded in the beginning of the bands
career. The new member, Phil, did a great job on the guitar, both solo and rhythm, compared
to their older guitarist who, in my opinion, didn’t fit in the band at all.
Rob worked really hard to get the crowd going. Adam moved a lot over the small stage,
and Dave behind the drums was as stable as always. They’ve had a lot of equipment on
the very small stage so they didn't have much space to move about.
The band line up today is:
Rob Flynn - lead vocals, guitar
Adam Duce - bass, background vocals
Dave McClain - drums
Phil Demmel - lead guitar
Rob has an amazing voice with a very broad vocal range. He worked really hard on
stage but he didn’t talk so much between the songs. Instead, they let the music do
the talking. Of course Rob thanked all the people who supported the band through the years
and coming to their shows. He said that he thought it was great fun to be back in Denmark
and Pumpehuset where they played before two or three times. And as usual, he invited the
crowd to sing a long in, “The Blood…” and the old classic,
“Davidian.”
The whole band seemed to be glad to be back in Scandinavia and there were no signs of
any exhaustion at all. The whole European tour started off in Dublin, Ireland on October
31st, which means they have been out for a long time. They also played a song by Metallica
from their era of greatness from the album, “Ride the Lightning.” The song,
“Creeping Death” wasn’t on the set list, and they did a great version of
it.
The expectations from the crowd were huge and the band didn’t disappoint their
fans at all. There was a lot of spontaneous sing along's throughout the crowd and when the band
started off the show, there was a mosh pit in front of the stage. It looked like Rob liked
what he saw and he encouraged the crowd to keep it up. The local security in Pumpehuset
wasn’t so great; there easily could have been an accident in front of the stage. All
of the nu-metal (mallcore) influences seemed to have totally disappeared when they played
last night. Machine Head delivered angry, aggressive metal.
Machine Head is back - with a vengeance - both live and on album. It’s only to
hope for that they will come back to Europe next year to give us more of what they
delivered last night. The lack of photos of the show depends on the high photo-restriction
they had at Pumpehuset, and flash photography was not allowed on the first three songs
either!
Thanks to Roadrunner Records and Jesper at Bonnier Amigo Sweden for the help at the
show, and also thanks to the two Roadrunner representatives in Denmark for the help.
No thanks to the local security at Pumpehuset, because of the unkind and brutal
treatment we received.
Set list
Imperium
Take My Scars
The Blood, the Sweat, the Tears
None But My Own
Left Unfinished
Ten Ton Hammer
Trephination
The Burning Red
In the Presence of my Enemies
Blood for Blood
Encores
Descend the Shadows of Night
Davidian
Creeping Death
Block