“Surprising” is the word that best describes Avenged Sevenfold’s recent show at the Alliant Energy Center on December 2, 2011. They came with a surprising, strangely chosen yet apparently “hand-picked” (in lead singer M. Shadows’s own words) supporting cast consisting of Black Veil Brides, Asking Alexandria, and Hollywood Undead (unfortunately, the rap/electronica/metal abomination couldn’t make it, much to the dismay of many fans). Alliant was a reasonably packed house for a metal-esque show. Those in attendance ranged from extremely young (perhaps as small as eight) to parents in their 30’s and 40’s, though the majority of attendees were tweens/teens, many of which were dressed in full Black Veil Brides regalia (a decision that will doubtlessly inspire shame in their later years).
This reviewer didn’t make it in time to see Black Veil Brides (a circumstance that will surely bring regret for many years to come) but, despite my best efforts, I made it in time to see Asking Alexandria (hereafter, AA), the British synthcore band that has become inexplicably popular in recent times (must be the British accents and snappy dressing). AA’s set was filled with screaming girls, off-key (and off-putting) singing, abysmal screaming, a plethora of open-note breakdowns and enough expletives to make Quentin Tarantino blush. AA must have been a real shock to the parents in attendance with their pseudo-metal, random techno passages, and all-around mediocre musical ability. AA was unsurprisingly terrible, but the crowd’s reasonably positive response was quite shocking, especially since they clearly had no idea how to rile up a crowd or that the young pit-goers they were playing to were nothing like the “underground” crowds they had been playing to during their “coming up” days. Their set wasn’t all bad, however: It did eventually end, allowing the stage to be prepared for the stars of the show, California natives Avenged Sevenfold.
After an eternity of stage set-up set to the dulcet tones of thrash metal classic “Master of Puppets” by the once-great Metallica, Avenged Sevenfold finally entered, and the crowd got to see what had taken them so long to take the stage. Their trademark Deathbat logo hung enormous across the stage as a three-dimensional sculpture. Ample pyrotechnics accompanied the band’s entrance to their recent single “Nightmare,” which comes off of their latest release of the same name. Already,the crowd was singing along in full force; it was immediately clear whom they had come out to see.
In “Nightmare,” guitarists Synyster Gates and Zacky Vengeance (no, they haven’t done away with the stage names yet) did their trademark “back-to-back”-style playing made possible by the fact that one is right-handed and the other left-. This showy method of playing (amongst many other flashy performance tricks) was a recurring theme throughout the night. Immediately afterwards Avenged Sevenfold segued into an older song, “Critical Acclaim” off of their 2007 self-titled release. “Critical Acclaim” was a significant moment in the concert as the song contains vocals originally performed by late drummer Jimmy “The Rev.” Sullivan. In a tasteful and surprisingly emotional move, Sullivan’s vocals were played via the Alliant system as a recording while M. Shadows held the microphone to the sky. After “Critical Acclaim”, the fast paced songs kept coming with “Welcome to the Family” and “Almost Easy”, taken from “Nightmare” and “Avenged Sevenfold,” respectively.
All of a sudden, the first Bic-worthy moment was upon the crowd as the opening chords of the slow-burning “Buried Alive” filled the venue. A surprising number of lighters materialized in the diverse crowd and swayed in time with the music until the heavy section kicked in during which the inaugural mosh pit also began. After the moshing subsided, Avenged Sevenfold reverted back to the slow tempo that the first half of the previous selection established in the ballad “So Far Away”, a song the band dedicated to The Rev. and all the audience’s loved ones that have also passed into the great unknown. In a clever move, the band followed this lament about the dead with their hit single “Afterlife”. This decision garnered the most crowd participation of the night with the entire venue booming the chorus of escaping from the afterlife. Again, The Rev.’s original vocals remained very much in the mix to the further appreciation of the fans.
The next track brought the biggest surprise of the night: “Waking the Fallen”-era Avenged Sevenfold (and M. Shadows’s screaming) were returning in the form of the epic “Second Heartbeat”. This metalcore classic brought the house down and culminated in the one minute long, shredding guitar solo by Synyster Gates. Following the journey back to 2003, the show took a turn for the weird with the Broadway-influenced “A Little Piece of Heaven”. This selection received a solid response from the crowd who even picked up the slack that M. Shadows threw their way during the choruses, surprising considering the song is way out in left field, especially with the supporting cast of bands and the crowd that the concert was playing to. This was the last track that featured the vocals of the deceased Rev.
At this point in the show and impromptu “contest” commenced amongst the racier ladies of the crowd, many of whom were certainly not of legal age to be “competing”. M. Shadows even got to take home a certain undergarment thrown his way in a move that, like the lighter wave, hearkens back to a different time, a time that Avenged Sevenfold is largely influenced by.
Like the rest of the night, the last two songs “Bat Country” (off of 2005’s “City of Evil”) and “Unholy Confessions” (another throwback to the group’s metalcore days of yore) garnered significant crowd participation. The latter included a moment when the band stopped playing and asked for the crowd to create a massive circle pit, which the young concertgoers hesitantly obliged. Naturally, this “last song” was a bit of a misnomer.
The band came out once more to cheers of “Sevenfold! Sevenfold!” and more gratuitous pyrotechnics. They wasted no time in launching into their encore song “The Beast and the Harlot”. This fast-paced, thrashy, catchy hit ended the concert in a way that could only have been topped by a song selected from the group’s magnum opus “Waking the Fallen”, but the audience by and large loved it all the same.
Needless to say for a band of Avenged Sevenfold’s caliber, they played perfectly, entertained the crowd effortlessly, and selected their songs sagaciously. Synyster Gates and Zacky Vengeance shredded their innumerable harmonies flawlessly, while bassist Johnny Christ and new drummer Arin Illejay held down the sometimes-complex rhythm end. Christ was the most active member of the band (outside of incredibly confident and energetic M. Shadows), but he did pause to sip from what appeared to be wine and even sat down on the stage boxes to take a load off while playing. Their stage show complimented the band perfectly with fire, explosions, great mood lighting, and more. The crowd loved every minute of this near perfect display, which was marred only by the supporting acts.
Avenged Sevenfold has come a long way in the eleven years that they have been a band. They are one of the only acts in the mainstream today that are deserving of their status, as they came from nothing and became the immensely popular artists that they are today. If you get the chance, go see them perform; I assure you won’t regret it (though, for your sake, I hope they have a more enjoyable, more fitting tagalong roster).
