Last Friday's gig was cool; it was at a small and intimate venue and I was standing just a few metres away from the stage. They had an additional touring musician playing keys and some percussion and guitar, which added to their live sound. Joel doesn't look like a stereotypical metal singer, but he's charismatic and sings with conviction. It was fun to see Lopez playing, since I never got to see him with Opeth. During the soundcheck there was some pretty intense drumming coming from behind the curtain - I don't know whether it was Martin or a drum tech, but it made me go "woah!".
The band's playing was really tight, but not mechanical or lacking fun, and there was an extended jam at the end of Void with some great guitar solos. You could sense that they were having a ball and loved to be there. The setlist included pretty much all of the new album except the closing track, and they also played 4 songs from the debut.
I also have to give props to the support band, Oddland: their music didn't blow me away, but they're good musicians, and it takes a lot of courage to play almost exclusively unreleased new material in a 35-minute set to a crowd that probably hadn't even heard their debut album before.