My Top 9 albums of 2018

How many times can you possibly listen to the same album over and over again? 2018 was an amazing year for new music. My three most favourite bands released new music, I basically had no choice but to put them in the top 3 spots on the list. But even apart from those, there were …

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Wacken Open Air 2018

"Wacken? Never ever again!!!" That's what I said after I had been to Wacken for the first time last year, because I totally hated it for various reasons (that you can read about here). I stuck to my resolution through every amazing band announcement... until they announced Ghost. I'm weak when it comes to Ghost, …

FortaRock Festival 2018 (Nightwish, Opeth, Avatar, …)

First weekend of June, time to start into the festival season! For me the place to be was in the Netherlands, more precisely Goffertpark in Nijmegen, for an incredible line-up at the sweet little FortaRock festival, although time and money restrictions only allowed me to go on the second day of the festival. Starting out …

Kamelot (+Delain, Battle Beast) – The Shadow Tour North America (Silver Spring, New York City, Clifton Park)

I've been following various bands across Europe for many years now and have visited many different countries this way, most of them more than once. By doing so, I was never able to bring up the financial means to travel to another continent, since I spent every cent on European roads. At some point, I …

Septicflesh – Codex Omega Tour (Marx Hamburg)

What better way to start the concert year than a Greek symphonic death metal band on a rainy Thursday night in January? When I bought my ticket for Septicflesh, I was surprised that they were booked into the Markthalle, a venue where usually more well known (metal) bands play, but on entering the building, it …

A weekend in London (Scar Symmetry, Vuur, Damnation Angels, Mastodon)

A diary for one of the better weekends of this year, concert venue hopping included! The planning London or Utrecht? That was the only question for me when Scar Symmetry (melodic death / modern / progressive metal from Sweden) announced their co-headliner shows with Vuur (progressive metal from the Netherlands). Because I hadn't seen them …

Damnation Angels – Last Embers Tour (Markthalle Hamburg)

You know those bands that are so amazing but at the same time so unknown that it's almost painful? Here's one of them - Damnation Angels are a band you might not have heard of before. I can't remember myself how I came across them almost 3 years ago (somehow on the almighty internet...), but …

Delain & Marco Hietala – Danse Macabre Tour (Zeche Bochum)

Sometimes, when I haven't seen a Delain show for a while, I tend to think nasty things like “actually, I don't like them that much, their music is too 'pop' and too simple...“ Then I go to another show and suddenly I remember why I like this band. But I probably wouldn't have made the …

Epica / MaYaN – The Dutch Principle (Hedon Zwolle, Patronaat Haarlem, Doornroosje Nijmegen)

Epica are another one of those bands that I just can't get enough of. Earlier this year I celebrated my 20th Epica show, but as if that would stop me from going to see them again... three days in the Netherlands, easy to reach by car and short distances between the cities given the small …