Gig Review – RULED BY RAPTORS / VIRAL STRAIN @ RHYL FRONT ROOM
[review by steve rastin]
“We really love our metal”.
But do you? Do you really?
OK, I see you hanging around in your Bring Me The Horizon T-shirt, I listen to you glaze-eyed annually as you drone on about how great Download was this year and I’m fully aware that you’ll spend several hundred quid for your ticket/ travel/ accommodation/ plastic cups of weak piss at the Manchester Enormodome to watch BlackMetallicaKills on a big screen as a prelude to being financially fisted up the rectum for a second time at the merch stand.
I do, I get all that, but……….
……..but have you ever even wondered how those gods that you idolise got to such an exalted state, what they did to get to the elevated position that they now find themselves in?
The answer in most instances is that they started off by hauling their gear and their dreams in a clapped-out van or overcrowded Nissan Micra around every toilet and sweatbox venue in Shitsville, Crapshire putting in the hours and the miles, building up a following and hoping for that big break……
…….which brings us to Rhyl on a Friday night where two excellent emerging metal bands are turning in quite excellent sets and the fans are out in force.
Fantastic, apart from one small detail – the fans have stayed in the pub down the road because the beer is a quid cheaper and that seems to be more important to them than supporting two bands who, if there is any justice in the world, will be the very same gods wowing them at Download and packing out the Enormodome in the not-too-distant future.
Viral Strain hail from Manchester, a city more famous for its punk and indie heritage, not that these four guys give a tuppenny about their home city’s lack of a metal history compared to London or the West Midlands for example.
The band’s sound is characterised by lead vocalist Chris Ward’s voice, higher pitched than that of most frontmen and a distinction that immediately piques the interest.
Their set is in some ways a greatest-hits-so-far run through their career to date and there are plenty of highlights to choose from: top moments for me include the relentless, chugging “Four Walls”, the slower-paced “War Of The Mind” with the pair of them broken up by a damn fine run through Judas Priest’s “Breaking the Law”.
The set ends with a blistering “I Don’t Care” which sees the band’s sound virtually tipping over from metal into vintage punk – maybe Manchester’s musical heritage has played an influence after all, because Slaughter & The Dogs fans would have lapped up that finale.
Ruled By Raptors called in as part of a three-date mini excursion away from their native Tyneside that also took in shows in Birmingham and Blackpool and it’s one of life’s great mysteries as to why these guys aren’t massive.
From the opening salvo of “Ducere” it is obvious that RBR don’t merely play gigs, they pummel the venue, the audience and themselves into absolute submission to their cause – seats go flying, mic stands get flipped and walls are seen as aids to a spot of parkour or free-running by the extremely athletic guitarist and bass player – they even leave a footprint on the (admittedly low) ceiling of the venue by the end of the set.
If you ever wondered how it must sound/ feel if you were laying down on a railway track in the path of an oncoming train, the opening three or four songs of RBR’s set will give you an answer – they’re an unstoppable rush of noise and energy that is absolutely irresistible.
The band are way, way more than a one-trick pony though, and as the set unfolds and adds more sonic light and shade it also becomes clear that social and political issues are very much a part of the RBR cause, maybe not surprising given that frontman Chris Bradley grew up in a north-eastern mining community with all that that instills in you.
That word “community” brings me back to where I began this review: are local metalheads a grassroots music community or merely consumers of the high end part of the genre?
I think it’s a pertinent question because indie, punk and pop-punk gigs are pulling in good numbers in the town and the metal scene elsewhere – Wrexham, for example – is booming.
There is a willingness among bands, promoters and venues to bring grassroots metal gigs to the town, but that isn’t going to happen unless they are supported by fans, so there can be no complaints from them if the grassroots metal scene in the town dies completely because cheap beer really is more important than the music they claim to love.
