What’s that? A what now?
Yes, dear people, here it is, almost a sort of anniversary; the 25th Amon Amarth review here at Metalmoments!
And how lucky are we that this special event should happen to coincide with them playing an astounding headliner show at the German edition of Metalfest?!

We felt pretty lucky, I can tell you that much, and we weren’t the only ones feeling blessed by the presence of the wrathful Norsemen.
Amon Amarth was headlining the first night of the German Metalfest, and they were doing it in style of course.
Now, I know it wasn’t much more than 10 days after the last time we saw them, at that time in concert in Vega, Copenhagen, but the short time between the two was no reason not to completely renew the show was it? Well, ok, a complete make-over is saying a bit too much, but the show certainly did not lack new elements!
The setlist was pretty much the same, with a few cuts in it to fit the shorter play-time of the festival (they had an hour and five minutes), and when the band came thundering on with War Of The Gods, it was a scene much like the one the title invokes happen in front of the stage; there were bodies flying everywhere! Apart from the crowd-surfers, there was heavy moshing and circle-pit action going on, very fitting to the relentless death-machine that Amon Amarth’s music is.
There was also loud scream alongs, which made me fear for the throats of the festival participants as this was only the first night after all. Or I would have been, had I not gladly joined in the screaming myself, loosing myself in the moment. Choruses like “death in fire” and “Oden, guide our ships…” came easily enough, but even if someone would get lost along the way we could always fall back on the reassuring words of Johan Hegg;

”Don’t worry, It’s death metal, no one knows what you say anyway”.

But I was supposed to mention something about renewals, wasn’t I?
Well, the first thing to spring to our attention was that Amon Amarth had brought (death in) fire! A lot of fire! Actually, there was almost constantly something going off, be it large flame-throwers, or bombs and sparklers. Heck, they even had a multiple shooting flame-thrower, shooting out in a semi circle, all at once or after one another in a line; this looked really impressive!
There was also the fact that for Guardians Of Asgaard, Hegg was joined by L.G. Petrov on stage for vocals. Ok, so I have seen this before, but only once, and they make up such a powerful duet that it is true death metal bliss to hear!
Another new aspect of the show, which was widely appreciated by the native audience but not so much by me, was that Hegg spoke primarily in German between songs. I believe he did a pretty good job of it, I at least didn’t understand a word of what he said!

So what were the real pro’s and con’s of the show then?
Let’s start with the negative, shall we? At least it will be over quickly…
Apart from the short length, the show really only had one serious set-back, but that was a pretty serious one… You see, it was, for some reason or the other, completely impossible to hear Johan Söderberg’s guitar, which is sad as a lot of the appeal of the music, for me at least, stems from the melodies shooting back and forth between Söderberg and Olavi Mikkonen…
On the positive side on the other hand, I would like to firstly point your attention to the fiery renewals I mentioned earlier; they really were a treat to watch, and they were perfectly fitted into the world of the music. We could really feel the fire-giant Surtur coming at us with all his might.
I have also already mentioned the duet in Guardians Of Asgaard, but the performance of Varyags Of Miklagaard also stands as one of the most shining moments of the evening, and everyone was clapping along to this one.
And how can anyone compete with that closing of a show, where The Pursuit Of Vikings was played, and a veritable shower, nay a wall of sparkles covered the entire stage at the grand finale! Unbearably awesome!

Setlist:

War Of The Gods
With Oden On Our Side
Destroyer Of The Universe
Masters Of War
Live For The Kill
Slaves Of Fear
Guardians Of Asgaard
Varyags Of Miklagaard
For Victory Or Death
Death In Fire
Twilight Of The Thunder God
Runes To My Memory
The Pursuit Of Vikings