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If there are indeed several layers of Hell, then attending a Slipknot extravaganza is more likely to be found circling the boundaries of a different celestial seat than dipping into toe into the murky flames surrounding a devil’s tea party.
The “Prepare for Hell” tour has been greeted with the enthusiasm of a lost, thirsty explorer wandering the desert and being greeted by the sight of a travelling salesman with a lifetime’s supply of Fentimen’s Ginger Beer for the price of a long, lingering kiss.
As the tour’s guests, Korn and King 810 had already wet the lips of the writhing mass of humanity who made their way to the Echo Arena in Liverpool, with two quite sumptuous displays of Nu Metal exuberance, the ever-lasting crate of beer, Balvenie Whisky and odd packet of nuts was supplied by Ohio’s finest, Slipknot.
Metal doesn’t come to Liverpool all that often, the city’s near neighbour Manchester, seems to hog all the great and emerging acts with the act of covertly miser but making a dedicated choice to travel down the East Lancs Road and performing for a hungry crowd in Liverpool was quite possibly the most decent act of heroic humanism displayed in recent times, certainly for the starved Metal fans of the city.
The evening was pure theatre, a three ringed circus in which the eye of the Mosh tornado heaved and raised like a surging current of water and at the centre of it was a band for whom laid down a single promise at the start of the night, to give the audience an evening to never forget and perhaps silently to throw down a gauntlet to likes of the long established American big four of the Metal genre to come to the home of music and blow the minds of a ravenous crowd, for Slipknot certainly did that.
With tracks such as My Plague, The Devil in I, Disasterpiece, the throbbing heartbeat of Duality andSpit It Out being performed to ever larger shouts of encouragement and applause, it’s possible to believe that a colossus had walked the ancient and modern walkways of Liverpool.
Shameless self belief, magnificent stage charisma and an overwhelming musical brutality, Hell is empty, all the tremendous music lured the lost souls to mosh with the enlightened on a never to be forgotten night in Liverpool.
Purple Revolver rating 9 bullets outta 10