DIMMU BORGIR And ENSLAVED Invade Pomona With Norwegian Extreme Metal

By Aniruddh "Andrew" Bansal

My rating points:

November 27th 2010, Fox Theatre, Pomona CA: The "Darkness Reborn" tour featuring Dimmu Borgir, Enslaved and Blood Red Throne's three pronged Nordic metal attack along with Los Angeles melodic black metallers Dawn Of Ashes is currently desecrating North America. The tour made its 17th stop here at the Fox in Pomona, and there was a long queue of fans outside the venue, some of whom having waited for several hours to get the best possible spot in the general admission pit.

Unfortunately, despite being at the venue since 5.30, I happened to entirely miss Dawn Of Ashes' performance tonight due to an unexpected change in my Dimmu Borgir interview schedule. I was really looking forward to see what Dawn of Ashes had in store, as they just underwent a complete change in musical direction with their latest album "Genocide Chapters", moving from the industrial scene towards the black metal scene. But because they are based out of LA itself, I'm sure I'll get to see them soon enough.

I managed to enter just in time for the start of Blood Red Throne's set. Their brand of death metal brought something different to this black metal oriented line-up. They played seven songs in the allotted time, and to my surprise, only one song from the latest album "Souls Of Damnation". I was expecting them to showcase the album a little bit more than that. Other than the new song "The Light, The Hate", they played something off of every other album, with as many as three songs from "Altered Genesis". It was also slightly mystifying as to why they aren't better known despite being a band for 12 years now. That said, they were tight in performance, displayed good energy on stage and looked like they were enjoying every minute of their time up there. But, I think it just wasn't the right crowd for them tonight. As is often the case in LA, judging from the conversations among people in the audience it was very clear that they were here to see Dimmu and Enslaved, and weren't ready to give the other two bands even the slightest chance to impress. I would like to see Blood Red Throne play with bands more suited to their style of music, the likes of Decapitated and Vader.

Their set list:
Smite
The Light, The Hate
Taste of God
Chaos Rising
Arterial Lust
The Children Shall Endure
Mephitication

Enslaved hit the stage next. This was one band I was really looking forward to see, ever since I saw them with Opeth last year. Unlike Blood Red Throne, they launched straight into their latest album "Axioma Ethica Odini". The intro "Axioma" and then the first song "Ethica Odini" got their set going. Most of the people in the crowd woke up and started head banging. The mosh pit started moving at a fair tilt and the band was sounding absolutely great right from the start. They stayed on the new album with "Raidho" and these songs were sounding just as brilliant as they do on the album. The masterful changes in tempo were going very well in the live setting, giving the crowd a chance to absorb the atmosphere created by the music during certain passages, and indulge in crazy mosh pits at other times. The band switched it up with an older song, "Fusion Of Sense And Earth" from the Ruun album, which added a whole another dimension to the performance and appropriately formed the centrepiece of the set.

Frontman Grutle and guitarist Ivar came across as endearingly funny whenever they addressed the crowd. Grutle drew a huge cheer as soon as informed us that tonight was Ivar's birthday. After saying a few words of thanks to the folks at their label Nuclear Blast, on they went with "Ground" from the Vertebrae album, and while Fusion Of É was the thrashiest song they played tonight, Ground was more of a slow, enjoyable rock tune. Ivar and Arve laid down the guitar melodies beautifully well along with Herbrand Larsen performing double duty on keyboards and clean vocals. The deeply entrancing end to this tune led the band into my favorite song from the new album, "The Beacon". They ended the night with the ever-amazing Isa. Enslaved proved themselves as brilliant musicians and performers in front of a huge Pomona crowd, and this was just the perfect taste of their latest album they would have wanted to give in order to gain some new fans. Here's wishing them a successful remainder of the tour, and hoping for a headline tour of their own next time around. For people who are going to the remaining shows on this tour, whatever you do, make sure you don't miss Enslaved's set.

Their set list:
Axioma
Ethica Odini
Raidho
Fusion of Sense and Earth
Ground
The Beacon
Isa

After a 30-minute wait, Dimmu Borgir finally took the stage to the delight of this greatly anticipative audience that had waited for this moment for hours on end. As expected, they had an elaborate stage set up to create the kind of ambience that goes along with their brand of symphonic black metal. The "Xibir" intro from the new album Abrahadabra led into "Spellbound (By The Devil)" which immediately invoked some people into crowd surfing. The faster segments of the music were accompanied by blinding strobe lights, a pattern that continued for the entire set. Silenoz and Galder on guitar along with Shagrath on vocals combined their crushing heavy sound excellently well with the symphony of the synthesizer. "IndoctriNation" was up next and with it the band made sure the intensity level among the fans didn't drop, after which they went into the new material with as many as five songs , the eponymous "Dimmu Borgir", the single "Gateways", followed by "Chess With The Abyss", "Born Treacherous" and "A Jewel Traced Through Coal". It was good to see the band confident enough with their latest album to have included more than half of it in the live set. Out of these six new tunes, my favourites were Chess With The Abyss, which offered more of the symphonic side and A Jewel Traced É which I thought was one of the most brutal songs of the night while still offering plenty of the melodic elements in patches.

Straight after the latest material, Shagrath asked a simple question, "How many old school Dimmu Borgir fans do we have in the house tonight?" to which we gave him a loud roar of approval. The band obliged by playing "The Blazing Monoliths Of Defiance" from the Spiritual Back Dimensions album. They ended the main set with "Vredesbyrd", but they were far from done yet.

They came back out for a lengthy encore which consisted of five songs including "The Serpentine Offering", "Puritania" and the amazing "Progenies Of The Great Apocalypse". Despite the fact that Dimmu Borgir presented some great new material in this show, Progenies was the highlight for me. It's greatly progressive and powerful which are the two main ingredients for a perfect live song. Shagrath thanked the crowd for making the show a success and they closed out the night with two final songs, "Mourning Palace" and "Perfection Or Vanity".

Overall, Dimmu Borgir played a sufficiently lengthy set and while focussing on the Abrahadabra songs, they still managed to represent their entire catalog excellently well, giving fans of the early material had plenty to cheer about. Shagrath was powerful on vocals and had commanding stage presence. Galder was making plenty of eye contact with people in the front row and did his best to get the crowd involved, and its safe to say he succeeded in his endeavour. On the other side of the stage, Silenoz was laying down the rhythm guitar parts with utmost ease, and the support cast of Cyrus on bass, Brat on keys and Daray on drums did their bit as well. The only flip side to the whole show was the sound, which was too bass heavy. At first I thought it was only because of my proximity to the stage, but even as I moved back to stand near the soundboard, it was still the same. Other than that, I have absolutely no complaints from this show. Along with Enslaved, Dimmu Borgir put on the kind of show extreme metal fans in attendance will remember for a while.

A spellbinding night of Nordic heavy metal.

The complete set list:
Xibir
Spellbound (By the Devil)
The Chosen Legacy
IndoctriNation
Dimmu Borgir
Gateways
Chess With the Abyss
Born Treacherous
A Jewel Traced Through Coal
The Blazing Monoliths of Defiance
Vredesbyrd
The Serpentine Offering
Puritania
Progenies of the Great Apocalypse
Mourning Palace
Perfection Or Vanity

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