Stars

As I arrived at de Melkweg yesterday, November 15, I couldn’t help but smile at the name: the Milky Way. I’m not entirely sure about metaphysical stuff like this, but I am pretty sure that heaven is located somewhere in the Milky Way. Or at least it was yesterday. Avenged Sevenfold played this very Milky Way and killed it. Someone in heaven (the guy with the beard) may not totally agree, seeing the many references the rockers make to his archenemy, but then again – the crowd did.

The crowd did more than just agree – they screamed, trashed, built pits and sang along ever so out of tune. After getting warmed up by Dutch hopefuls As Enemies Arise, they were more than ready for A7X to start their show with one of their best anthems so far: Nightmare. We got most certainly dragged down below, down to the devil’s show. They continued with Critical Acclaim, a song that seems a bit forgotten by the A7X fans sometimes but definitely deserves the spotlight. The crowd was energetic, the music was better than our high expectations and we may have felt squashed a couple of times.

When the guys welcomed Mike Portnoy to the family with the adequately named Welcome to the family our attention focused to the drummer who had been hidden from sight by his massive drum set up until then. Portnoy did an amazing job last night, as expected, and I’m sure a lot of kids welcomed him to the family while screaming their longs out. The welcoming got even better later on, when all of Synyster Gates’ guitars seemed to have broken down and Johnny and Mike improvised away, making me wish I brought some sort of recording device instead of my phone and its dead battery. Everything seemed to be working again, but A7X didn’t get a chance to continue because the crowd started chanting “Portnoy, Portnoy” over and over again. A warm welcome into the A7X family.

The Rev was ever so close during the entire show. People held up signs, Matt told about their last time in Amsterdam (which involved a dead pigeon, ‘shrooms and police on bike) and the tattoos and guitar straps were in full sight. Every song that involved losing someone made us reminisce about the genius that was Jimmy Sullivan. And though I’m not, like I said, very good at metaphysical stuff, I do hope heaven is located somewhere in the Milky Way. Because that might keep his genius just a tad bit closer.

Photo by Bart Heemskerk, All Rights Reserved. © 2010 Info @ Photocero.com