Panic Room, Essen, Germany10th October 2015
Antimatter & The Whispering
Two or three years ago I had the pleasure to see ANTIMATTER live for the first time as acoustic set with Mick Moss on the acoustic guitar accompanied by VIC ANSELMO, who lend her voice for the backing vocals on the album ‘Fear of a unique identity‘, on keyboards. Now I was eager to see him perform with a complete live band.
The Whispering
THE WHISPERING from Essen were opening the evening. The duo consists of Fabian Regmann (vocals & guitar), who is known as drummer of DISBELIEF, and Veronique Erdelyi (violin). Both musicians are also active in the Dark Metal band NEVER COMES SILENCE and are playing as a duo together since 2013. Regmann himself calls the 2014 released EP a “Ambient-Folk-Dark-Acoustic record”. An album is planned for next year. THE WHISPERING presented a short set of songs that can be described as melancholic Rock/ Neo Folk. Nice but after a while a bit boring. Well, at least for me. Definitely not my cup of tea. https://www.facebook.com/thewhisperingband
Rating
Music: 5
Performance: 7
Sound: 8
Light: 6
Total: 6.5 / 10
Antimatter
Founded in 1998 by Mick Moss and former ANATHEMA band member Duncan Patterson, the British band described itself to be the saddest band of the world. The music embraces elements of Dark Rock, Progressive Rock, Alternative Rock, also some Trip Hop. Together they produced three albums before Duncan left the band in 2005 after finishing ‚Planetary Confinement‘ in order to pursue his own project ION. Thus Mick decided to work alone with ANTIMATTER and released in 2007 the critically acclaimed album ‘Leaving Eden‘. With the just launched ‘The Judas Table‘, six studio albums, two live albums and three compilation albums are released. In 2013, Mick Moss toured busily through Europe with his acoustic set, mainly accompanied by the singer / songwriter VIC ANSELMO on the keyboard and singing the backing vocals. Now he is touring with his electric band, consisting of his session musicians as there are Dave Hall (lead guitar), Ste Hughes (bass) and Liam Edwards (drums). http://www.antimatteronline.com / https://www.facebook.com/antimatteronline
Music & Performance
While the venue had not many guest when the supporting act performed, it quickly filled right in time before Mick and his band entered the stage. The set started with a song, ‘Killer’, from the new album, that was launched just the day before, followed by one of the last one, ‘Paranova’. The new songs were well received but of course the audience moved and danced more to the older; well-known songs. Anyway each song was rewarded with a big applause. As already mentioned I only saw ANTIMATTER as acoustic show once but now experiencing the songs performed with a band had another quality for sure. While the first one makes the listener focus more on the vocals and the lyrics the latter has a more energetic atmosphere. Every now and then Dave used an e-bow to produce an intense weeping sound which underlined perfectly the melancholy of the songs. Ste on the bass guitar did his best to rock the place. And Mick played his guitar so soulfully giving the sound space to develop and linger.
Actually I missed a bit Mick addressing to the audience but later after a thunderous applause, which seemed to embarrass him a bit, he thanked the audience heartily, informing us that it is a great moment for him as the new album was released just yesterday. The next songs he wanted to introduce to us were a song of his side project THE SLEEPING PULSE and then some of ‘Leaving Eden‘ and ‘Fear of a unique identity‘ that he produced after a five years break. Furthermore he mentioned that the backing vocals of the latter album were sung by VIC ANSELMO who was here amongst the audience as a guest. The last song ANTIMATTER performed was a cover version of PINK FLOYD’s song ‘Welcome to the Machine’. I have to say it was so well covered in a typical ANTIMATTER style that I hardly recognized it if I didn’t know the song from the lyrics. The concert seemed to end far too soon and with thunderous applause the band left the stage but of course the audience demanded an encore. The very last song was introduced by Mick to be actually visually accompanied by a video but unfortunately it was not ready for the show.
After that song the band left for good but the fans had, a bit later, the chance to catch up with the guys for a chat, signing or a photo at the merchandise.
Setlist
01. Killer
02. Paranova
03. Firewalking
04. Black eyed man
05. The last laugh
06. Monochrome
07. Uniformed and black
08. Over your shoulder
09. Can of worms
10. Gagging order (SLEEPING PULSE)
11. Redemption
12. Leaving Eden
13. Wide awake in the concrete asylum
14. The Parade
15. Welcome to the machine (PINK FLOYD cover)
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17. Stillborn empires
Rating
Music: 10
Performance: 9
Sound: 8
Light: 7
Total: 8.5 / 10
All pictures by Daniela Vorndran (http://www.vorndranphotography.com / http://www.facebook.com/blackcatnet)
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