June 8, 2023
Toronto, Canada @ The Danforth Music Hall
Review/photos: Billy Klare
I had this show circled on my calendar since it was first announced early in the year. Thrash is my preferred metal genre and each of these bands have more than a few landmark albums. I grew up listening to Kreator, Death Angel and Sepultura and still fondly remember their earlier live shows back in the 1980’s. I certainly had no idea back then that I would still watching these same bands in 2023. All I can say is – Metal for Life!
Spiritworld was first up at a ridiculously early time of 6:30pm causing me to miss half their opening set. I wasn’t familiar with this band at all prior to the show. My first impression was they successfully blended thrash, punk, crossover and even a sprinkle of country music into an unique aggressive mix that worked for me based on the little I heard. They got my attention so I ordered their latest album titled “Deathwestern” a few days later.
Death Angel took the stage next working the crowd into a frenzy opening with “Lord of Hate” from the Killing Season record. You can always count on singer Mark Osegueda to give his all on stage and his voice has held up incredibly well. His performance was on full display as the band ripped into “Voracious Souls” from the genius “The Ultra – Violence” album as the mosh pit reached peak levels. Mark still hits all the notes and remains very active on stage. Guitar duo Rob Cavestany & Ted Aguilar continue to be a staple of the Death Angel live show delivering their aggressive riffs & solos from their preferred stage sides. We get three more relatively recent songs including “The Moth’, “The Dream Calls for Blood” and “Humanicide”. The set ends on another high point with a mini-medley of “The Ultra-Violence” & “Thrown to the Wolves”. My personal opinion – Death Angel were the best band of the night (as they were on their recent tour with Testament & Exodus).
One interesting takeaway from the show. Mark from Death Angel is very good at sharing an interesting fact that connects the band to each city. Tonight he told the Toronto crowd that Much Music’s Pepsi Power Hour was the very first music video channel to play their earliest music videos and he was very grateful for that. If you were a Canadian metalhead in the eighties, this reference make perfect sense.
Kreator was the third band of the night with the best stage design / production incorporating massive 3D imaging from their newish “Hate Uber Alles” album artwork. Based on my experience, Kreator’s live show is remarkably consistent. Millie and team always deliver a strong performance and tonight was no exception. Kreator tends to excel in song selection ensuring they keep all fans engaged regardless of when they discovered the band. Older fans like myself were very pleased to hear “Endless Pain”, “Pleasure to Kill”, “Extreme Aggression” and “Coma of Souls” material well represented in the setlist. I especially enjoyed a very aggressive version “Betrayer”. The band delivered some of their newest songs including “Hate Uber Alles”, “Satan is Real” and “666 – World Divided” but “Enemy of God” & “Hordes of Chaos” worked best out of all the later era songs.
As Kreator approached the back end of their set, the crowd went into a frenzy as Millie came out waiving the well known flag of hate kicking off the best three song run of the night beginning with “Flag of Hate”, “Violent Revolution” and closing with the brutal “Pleasure to Kill”. Mille demanded a mosh pit to end the show and the audience happily delivered. After almost 40 years in the business, Kreator haven’t lost a step. Millie’s capable bandmates Sami, Frederic and Ventor all successfully contributed to the performance on this night.
Sepultura ended the evening with an impressive energetic show. The setlist was heavily skewed to the recent “Quadra” record (5 songs – almost half the entire set) which I enjoyed as I thought “Quadra” was the best Sepultura record since 1996’s “Roots”. Most of the remaining songs were pulled from the “Roots” & “Chaos AD” records and the audience eagerly sang the choruses with Derrick. The crowd favorite of the night appeared to be “Roots Bloody Roots”. In contrast, the clear highpoint for me occurred when the band asked if there were any old school Sepultura fans out there and then unleashed “Arise” on the unsuspecting audience. Needless to say, all hell broke loose at that point.
My preferred era of Sepultura definitely includes Max and Igor but I have no problem admitting I still enjoy the current formation of the band, especially in a live setting. Derrick Green is a powerful metal frontman and Andreas Kisser is one of the best live metal guitarists oozing charisma on stage. That said, I was incredibly disappointed the band completely ignored their pivotal “Beneath the Remains” masterpiece (and earlier albums). That’s unacceptable for fans like me who supported Sepultura from the very beginning of their musical career. This same thing happened at the last 1-2 shows I attended. Come on guys, cut at least one of the newer songs to make some room. Take a page from Kreator’s playbook.
The Danforth Music Hall is one of my favorite locations for metal shows in Toronto. The venue holds up to 1,400 people and I suspect it was filled to about 90% capacity. Acoustics are good throughout the room and you can feel that bass deep in your chest. Lot’s of bars throughout the venue to purchase overpriced beers. Nice to see a good mix of older fans and a few newer generations of fans which is a healthy sign for the Toronto metal scene.
Overall, a very enjoyable night of energetic thrash metal from three legendary bands whose significant contributions helped put thrash metal on the map. We can all argue over setlist choices (and I did) but I’m sure everyone in that venue would agree each band continue to perform / play at the highest level despite their “veteran” status. Also, very cool to see a newer unique band like Spiritworld added to the roster. My only ask of the bands is to dig a little deeper in song selection next time and play a few more deep tracks to mix things up.
Note: The attached photographs were taken by me on my I-phone in the middle of the crowd and not intended to represent or replace professional level photography. I just wanted to share some clips from the show.