There is nothing like the sound of Amorphis in the morning!

First song on the menu was the eminent Silver Bride, and I must admit that I was surprised to see what an enormous crowd that had already gathered even at this early hour; Amorphis was after all the first band to play the True Metal Stage this the second day of Wacken.
Nevertheless, the crowd had gathered, but as the time and the atmosphere would dictate, people were pretty calm to begin with, as was the band members. But then again, with a band with the qualities of Amorphis, the music can certainly stand on its own, and having such an early slot actually worked well for them I think. At least it paved the way for a good day to come, as they set the bar pretty high.

As is normal for festivals, and Wacken’s main stages especially, the sound wasn’t all what we could have hoped for, and this was the biggest drawback for the band. In the beginning the drums were much, much too loud and deafened out all the rest, but in fixing this they only revealed a very muddy guitar sound which sadly lost many of the melodic and finer details which this band do so well. The only thing which got across well was the keyboards actually, so in a way it was a nice little break when all musicians took a break in House Of Sleep, for the benefit of a pleasant and pretty lively sing-along.
All in all, the set was a well-made mix of newer stuff and old classics, a well built set for a festival which didn’t leave anyone out, and my guess is that everyone present could walk away smiling and satisfied.

A special nod of appreciation must go to Tomi Joutsen, who once again proved his skill as frontman by creating the aforementioned sing-along, at several times getting the crowd to loudly clap along to the songs and generally looking cool on stage as he windmill headbanged his mighty dreadlocks.
Even so, this will not be a show which goes down in the history books, but it was a very pleasant and well-delivered start of the day.

Setlist:

Silver Bride
Sky Is Mine
Towards And Against
The Castaway
Alone
Against Widows
From The Heaven Of My Heart
The Smoke
House Of Sleep
Black Winter Day
My Kantele