Hi all,
decided to register after many years of lurking.
First of all, to clear all doubt, the setlist was the same as everywhere, so no Overture 1928.
Second, I wanted to post a little review. I arrived with a friend around 7 PM from Croatia, as we both worked until 4 o'clock, and weren't interested in the other bands appearing at the festival, apart from Black Label Society who played before DT. A few words about the festival - it's located in the river valley in northeast Slovenia, between some pretty high hills, so as soon as sun had set, the air was nice and fresh, a real treat after having to survive the heat from the last two weeks. It's a five-day festival, if I'm not mistaken, has a large camping area and it was full to the brink, with a lot (a grand majority, even) of people from all around Europe, especially the Germanic and Nordic countries. The location is great for the campers because the river is literally a 100 meters from the campsite. Also, it's located at the edge of the town of Tolmin, and right near the festival's main entrance is a supermarket, and there were no restrictions about bringing food or drinks in the camping grounds (I had a can of beer with me in the festival area as well, no-one seemed to mind it).
Anyway, back to the show - I used to listen to BLS up until the Mafia album so I knew a few of the tracks they played, it was great fun. There was a Zakk Wylde solo spot which was him basically playing the same three notes at 300 BPM for about four or five minutes.
Theirs was also an hour-and-a-half set, after which we had a drink and ate a burger (we should have eaten the goulash stew, apparently it was really good) and went back for DT. The show started at 10:30 PM, with the False Awakening Suite and the great, great animation of all the albums. Afterlife IMO is not a great choice for the opener as it is not a well-known DT song, especially for festival crowds. (In my estimate, there were about 2,000 people watching the show.) Then it was Metropolis and everyone went wild, and CIAW. Overall, the first half of the show was kind of dragged down by The Crimson Sunrise and About to Crash, but the setlist choices from As I Am until the end were great, especially the three uptempo songs in a row which really had the crowd going, and Wither was a nice little break. There wasn't an encore; i.e. they played Behind The Veil right after BITS, without leaving the stage.
Petrucci was in a better mood than in Zagreb two years ago, he was smiling a lot and gesturing the crowd to clap the beat, as was James on several occasions, and the crowd was pretty responsive. Jordan had a mini-solo spot before About To Crash and TSCO. As for the sound, it was really loud and Petrucci's backing vocals were inaudible due to the loudness level. However, when I tried to put fingers in my ears for a few seconds at a time, it made a huge difference and suddenly I could hear everything crystal clear... I should probably get some good earplugs for the next time I go to a concert.
Also, James had two speeches, one about the band's 30th anniversary, and another about them working on the new album to be released next year, and said that they would return to Slovenia.
That's pretty much it, looking forward to next year's tour.
And to posting on this great forum!
Topic: 2015-7-21 - Metaldays Festival (Tolmin, Slovenia) ROLL CALL & REVIEW (Read 3262 times)