Palladium, Cologne, Germany 28th January 2023
Bad Omens - “Concrete forever Tour” - Special guests: Poppy
Now that was quick. Less than a year after their ‘The Death of Peace of Mind’ Tour, BAD OMENS are back on the road much to the delight of their new fan base. While in 2023 the Live Music Hall was big enough for the crowd, now the much larger Palladium has been sold-out TWICE in a heartbeat, which serves as a sign that TikTok not only can produce Trap artists.
The band from Richmond, Virginia around frontman Noah Sebastian has received lots of praise from critics and enjoyed their spot in the limelight not only on social media, but also on tours with the likes of A DAY TO REMEMBER, THE GHOST INSIDE, and BEARTOOTH. BAD OMENS also have been confirmed as support for the UK leg of the spring tour of BRING ME THE HORIZON in 2024, which is interesting as the band has repeatedly been compared to BMTH, which the band has called “flattering, yet frustrating”. Nevertheless, the long queue outside of predominantly young people waiting to be let into the Palladium was a testament to BAD OMEN’s popularity in its own right.
Poppy
The task of opening up the evening fell on POPPY, a YouTube-Artist turned singer. Moriah Rose Pereira, as she was born, is on her fifth studio album release, with her music gradually getting darker and more aggressive. https://www.impoppy.com
Music & Performance
A little earlier than announced at 7:30 pm the lights went low and the intro of the opening song ‘Bloodmoney’ started to play, the screen in the back of the stage began displaying a heart rate line moving in unison with the music, and POPPY and her bandmate walked on stage to start the song. While the visual effects where stunning, and the sound production was sufficiently loud, the whole performance seemed eerily remote and disconnected from the audience - and throughout the set there was literally zero interaction with the crowd. I don’t know if that was intended, but the effect was that very few of the audience members seemed to care or enjoy what was happening on the stage. Also, the musical performance with lots of samples and big breaks contributed to the disjunct character of the performance, which made it a bit unnerving to watch. So after 40 minutes not everyone was sad that POPPY stormed off stage before the last song was even finished.
Rating
Music: 4
Performance: 6
Sound: 8
Light: 8
Total: 6.5 / 10
Bad Omens
So a mere six weeks, after the other contender of the newly created genre baby-making Metal - the band SLEEP TOKEN - graced the Palladium stage with it presence, it was time for the quartet from the United States to entertain scores of Generation Z members with their musical output. http://www.badomensofficial.com
Music & Performance
The change-over seemed to take ages, and the anticipation levels in the crowd reached sky-high levels. Shortly before 9pm, a videogame-like animation popped up on the screens and announced that the BAD OMENS experience was loading. Shortly after that, guitarist Joakim Karisson - wearing an all-black hooded sweater - started the first chords of the opener ‘Artificial Suicide’, with his band mates joining him one by one. The huge projection, coupled with pyrotechnics, the occasional confetti cannon, and acoustic precision made the gig a worthy spectacle. The audience was absolutely here for it. Kudos go out to the guy in the blue shark costume, who had fun crowd surfing, which made a very funny watch, as smiling security people slightly struggled to pick him from the hands of the crowd. BAD OMEN’s collaboration song with POPPY - V.A.N. - had its live premiere on this tour and was a visual and acoustic highlight of the set, as it showcased the creative energy of both artists in their performance.
In terms of visual entertainment, the light show was really exceptional. The genre-defying musical art performance of BAD OMENS can only be described as a wild ride. From neck-breaking circle pit action during ‘Glass Houses’ to the melodious, tear-jerking emotional ‘The Death of Peace of Mind’, the band managed to take the audience with them through the complete emotional spectrum, which is probably the root cause for the band’s massive success and their cult-like following. All good things had to come to an end after 70 minutes of playtime after ‘Just Pretend’. The audience - through frantic screaming and clapping - managed to extract two more songs from the band, ‘Concrete Jungle’ and ‘Dethrone’, as an encore… and the spent but happy audience was sent off into the night.
Setlist
01. ARTIFICIAL SUICIDE
02. Like a Villain
03. Glass Houses
04. The Grey
05. What Do You Want From Me?
06. Limits
07. IDWT$
08. Take Me First
09. Bad Decisions
10. Nowhere to Go
11. V.A.N (with Poppy) (Live Debut)
12. Broken Youth
13. Miracle (Remix Version - Break)
14. Never Know
15. THE DEATH OF PEACE OF MIND
16. Just Pretend
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17. CONCRETE JUNGLE
18. Dethrone
Rating
Music: 9
Performance: 9
Sound: 8
Light: 9
Total: 8.5 / 10
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