Well, the show was enjoyable, but not as great as their previous one here in 2014 on AFTR tour.
I'll start from the downsides of the show. Two biggest problems with yesterday's show were:
1) the sound quality
2) setlist
What can I say, the sound quality was kind of poor. I could barely make out JLB in the mix during Afterlife and the first half of Metropolis. It got better after the instrumental part, but it was still underwhelming. My friend who is a casual fan and doesn't know some songs by heart said he often couldn't make the vocal melodies out of the mix. Not the case for me, because it's obviously much easier to hear what JLB is singing when you know what he's going to sing, but still, that was a downside.
While the choice to include one song from each album is fine, and structuring the setlist chronologically was an interesting idea, the flow and pace really suffered from it. Three balls to the wall metal songs in a row was exhausting, and if As I Am and Panic Attack were well received by the crowd, it seemed to me Constant Motion fell flat. Wither and Bridges in the Sky sequence worked for the main set closer well enough, but Behind the Veil didn't work for the encore at all. I mean, I enjoyed the song, it was great to hear it being played live, and it's a treat to the fans alright, but a lot of people just stood there, not knowing the song.
On the other hand, Afterlife is a great opener indeed. I'm not a big fan of WDADU, but the song worked live very well. Same goes for Burning My Soul, this tune was killer. I think the selection of songs themselves was fitting for the festival, with some fan favourites and some rarely played songs, but the order of playing probably should've been changed, like, say, Metropolis for the encore was an obvious option. I mean, yeah, it's probably been done more than a hundred times now, but the crowd will actually know the song and participate in the fun and whatnot.
The highlights for me were Metropolis (we got it as a part of medley in 2009, and LtL was an encore in 2011, so it was nice to finally hear it live in full even with a not-so-great sound), Burning My Soul, TSCO (even though it's overplayed to death, and I've heard it live in 2009), Panic Attack (again, heard it in 2009 but this track is a fabulous thing live), Bridges in the Sky (we haven't got a proper ADTOE tour show in Russia, 2011 tour happened before the album was released, so this was a first time).
There were two huge screens on the sides which, as usual, featured some visuals and some close-up videos on musicians, helping people in the back to see MM making funny faces while playing and this kind of stuff. JLB didn't talk a lot, said once again the album is going to come up in early 2016 and they'll return to Russia with the tour for it. He also said that we raaaawk.
Also there was some issue with a mic somewhere during first two songs (unfortunately I didn't notice that, so I don't know what exactly happened), and the first thing he said after Metropolis was something along the lines "This microphone thing? I totally did it on purpose". I'll need to rewatch the videos when they'll appear on YouTube to see what this was all about.
So, as I said, good show, but DT has such a huge repertoire, it's tough to come up with a great set for the festival. The evening with type of shows is where they truly shine, so I'm eagerly waiting for the next album now, and hope they'll keep on their promise and will return here promoting it next year.
Edit: Oh yeah, I forgot to add one thing. The crowd seemed pretty small, compared with the huge one in 2014.
Topic: 2015-07-03 Darkside Festival (Moscow, Russia) ROLL CALL & REVIEW (Read 2990 times)