Krisiun are celebrating their 25 year anniversary this year and coincidentely have recently released a new album. What more reasons could a band want to do European tour. The last show of this tour took place in Rotterdam on this Sunday metal matinee. The venue added three local supports as Krisiun brought none.

Sepiroth was the first one the take the stage. The name didn’t ring a bell when I saw the announcement of the gig. On stage I recognised singer Ben – who also organises the Dordrecht Doom festivals and sings in a couple of other bands such as Night of Suicide – and I vaguely remember seeing them play more than 10 years ago when they were just a bunch kids. They play mostly old school style death metal with some more modern, technical elements thrown in the mix. These technical sections however sound a bit incoherent or were played sloppily. The old school sections sounded quite okay. Musically a bit generic. A solid warm-up for this not that cool anyway.

The second band is a band far older, namely Obtruncation, who released their debut album in the nighties and the follow-up only last year. Nevertheless they never split up and some occasional gigs were played in between. Musicwise they play death metal with quite some technical and fast riffing with the songs of the new album feeling a bit faster than the older material. I really like this band and should get their debut album some how.

The last time I saw Mike van Mastright must have been in 1994, when Sinister were promoting Diabolical Summoning. He vanished from the scene in the late 90s after his departure from Sinister and a short stint with Houwitser. But now he is back in the band Neocaesar, together with ex-Sinister guitarist Bart van Wallenberg, as well as Eric de Windt as a drummer who also was shortly in Sinister and bassist Michel Alderliefsten who also was in Sinister for a brief period of time. So it is not surprising that sound a whole lot like old Sinister, in the style of Hate and Diabolical Summoning. Quite a good performance, apart from a couple of mistakes here and there. And the crowd like them as well. A minor stage diver incident interrupted the final song – Valhalla Rising – as apparently the guitar got disconnected or so. Well they just started the song all over. I’d be much anticipating the album they have nearly finished recording and should be out at the end of this year (according to Mike).

I have been following the Brazilian brothers in Krisiun since the release of their debut album from 1995 and seen them numerous times live. They are always very solid. The last couple of albums it seem, they slowed down a bit and the raging fury of the first couple of albums is gone. They had their creative peak with Conquerors of Armageddon – their third album. They started with Ominous, a bit of an odd choice as it comes from an in-between EP from 2004. Nevertheless they worked through a set of mostly newer material, with two songs of their latest album Forged in Fury and no less than three of the previous. Vengeance revelation is always on the set, and so it was now, and Ravager of Conquerors of Armageddon was played as well. Near the end of the set Max played a drum solo, which means that he basically plays what he usually does – lots of double bass, tons of fills on the toms and blastbeats – but without guitars, bass and vocals on top of it. For an encore Kings of Killing was on the set list, but they decided to play Black Force Domain instead. It’s odd that I’ve seen them numerous times, but this is only the second time they play this song. It exemplifies the fury in their early music, especially with the chaotic leads at the end. In the end Krisiun were solid as ever, but everything feels a tad slowed down and morelaid-back than it used to be. And I always will have a bit of a weakness for this band, whatever they play.