Essence, a thrash trio from our very own Denmark, was the only band supporting Hypocrisy at this show on their End Of Disclosure tour. The reason for this was that, tragically, Hate had had to cancel as their bass player had died only two nights earlier. How this would affect the other bands we could only guess at this point...

Even before the band entered the stage, I got a bad feeling about the show, and it had nothing to do with the issue I mentioned earlier. No, the problem here was the worse than worthless sound that desecrated our ears as the bands intro began crapping itself out of the speakers; luckily I suppose for Essence, there weren’t more than about ten people in the hall at the time this happened, so they didn’t scare many away with it.
The band quickly entered the stage and took over though, and when the combined guitars of Lasse Skov (also on vocals) and Mark Drastrup introduced us to the first song of the night, Final Eclipse, it seemed that the sound had taken a serious turn to the better. It didn’t take more than a few seconds and the playing of Martin Haumann to completely shatter this image though, as his drums literally blasted all the other instruments out into a musical black hole from which no sound could escape...
Luckily, the sound guy at Markthalle was awake and managed through no more than about half a song to steer things in a better direction and from there on out Essence actually had a very descent sound to work with.

“It’s an honour to be here! Thanks for sticking around even though we’re not Hypocrisy.”
- Lasse Skov (vocals/guitar)

Whether it was the improved sound, or just the fact that someone was playing, I cannot say, but it didn’t take long for more and more people to start entering the hall. Admittedly, most stayed in the back or on the sides, and it was quite possibly the smallest crowd I have seen at Markthalle, but it was a great deal better than what Essence had begun with!
Still, the ripping thrash was only making minor ripples in the audience pond – the few who populated the front row smiled and banged their heads occasionally, and even let out a half-hearted “hey” chant in the beginning of Gemstones on the request of bassist Rasmus ‘Kalke’ Munch Nielsen, but back in the shadows of the hall there wasn’t much enthusiasm to be found...
We had to move nearly to the end of the show to see some “real” response in the form of a three man moshpit to the song Darkness Returns, a small thing that if nothing else at least justified the long set Essence had.

The lack of response for the band was very regrettable, and quite surprising too if you ask me.
For one thing, Essence delivers a quite potent dose of thrash, something which usually goes straight up the German alley, especially since at least on album they bear some resemblance to one of Germany’s own largest pride’s – Kreator. This is of course without losing their own sound, and live the likeness wasn’t as tangible as it is especially on their latest album, Last Night Of Solace, but it did show up in some places.
What was more surprising though, was that the performance Essence was delivering didn’t attract more response from the Hamburg metalheads. This was star quality stuff enveloped in a professionalism that belied their young age!
If I had not known about the Hate tragedy from home, Essence concert certainly wasn’t giving anything away that would make me think there was something amiss; there were constant smiles on the band members (when they weren’t looking metal-hard that is), and they were a lively bunch which constantly visited the edge of the stage in an attempt on getting the crowd more involved. Skov also had his best frontman demeanour on and was quite chatty between songs without getting of topic or becoming tiresome to listen to, and all of the guys were going hard at it during the songs.
As mentioned earlier, live-bassist Much Nielsen also tried a hands-on approach in getting a response from the crowd, and both his performance and the skill he especially displayed in the intro for blood Culture showed that he was a good fit for the band; without knowing the situation more intimately, I wouldn’t be surprised to see him make permanent member at some point.

This is the first time we review Essence, but if you’ve followed our site closely you should know that it isn’t the first time the band appears at Metalmoments – they also got a special mention the time they were supporting Entombed in Copenhagen last year, and already at that point I was gripped by the bands performance quality.
The performance was in no way less gripping this time around, and I can only find one point of critique for the show, which is the length of it. I don’t know whether their time had been lengthened because there was one less band on the line-up or not, but I think it would have been better for Essence if their set had been two songs shorter – this would have better helped keep the energy up and left us wanting more. As it was, the performance can’t get enough praise but the songs began blending into each other towards the end. More variation in the future should help relieve this problem.

Setlist:

Final Eclipse
Blood Culture
Gemstones
Lost In Violence
Shades Of Black
Darkness Returns
Fractured Dimension