Even though I have been living in the Hague area for more than a decade and a half, I never went to the club named Musicon although I rode passed it on my bicycle numerous times. The American thrash metal act Flotsam & Jetsam played a gig there as part of a 3-day drum clinic organised by Cesar Zuiderwijk of the Golden Earring. Apparently he is a big fan of Flotsam & Jetsam’s current drummer who was invited to participate in the clinic in the afternoon. The gig was held a bit later in the evening. Musicon has still a bit of that 90s old school club feel that has been replaced by stale concrete fortresses nearly everywhere. And the place was filled quite well. I guess most came for the gig and didn’t take part in the clinic.

Anyway there was no support act (Why? there are plenty bands in the area – and there are very few opportunities in The Hague for metal bands to play as there are hardly any metal gigs at all there anymore). So Flotsam & Jetsam took the stages and started playing a song off their new, self-titled album – Seventh Seal. Followed by Me off Drift. These sounded quite ok, but for Flotsam & Jetsam it is mostly the first two albums that really count. Hammerhead was next off the debut. Erik can’t really reach those high notes anymore but still sings quite okay. The new drummer is very solid, but he the newer songs are overloaded with drum fills and other frills which don’t seem to fit with this band. To my surprise they played no less than 3 songs of Drift – not their best material really – and also 3 off the new album, the other six were divided equally between the first two. No Place for Disgrace is their finest song and the set-closer Doomsday for the Deceiver isn’t far behind. A very fine gig.