Christmas had came and gone, I spent New Year's Eve with a small group of friends at Jeff & Limey's. Theevening consisted of beer, weed, and us all partying shirtless for some unknown reason. Now my 17th birthday was here. To celebrate I had Craig & Sanjai over for dominos pizza. Nothing special I suppose but it didn't matter to me because the best gift of all was just around the corner.
Just days after turning 17, there was an all ages show happening at the Concert Hall, the same place I saw Slayer, and I hadn't been back there since. This show was a bit different however, as it was an all ages matinee show featuring a slew of bands. It was on a Saturday afternoon so it was no problem rounding up a car load of guys to join along.
The show almost seemed to good to be true since the line up was out of hand and overwhelming. When the day of the show came and we arrived at the gig, we were a bit upset to find out Danzig would not be performing as well as Corrosion of Conformity. I wasn't too heartbroken over the absence of Danzig even though he was the frontman for legendary punks The Misfits, but I was pretty crushed to learn I would not be seeing C.O.C.
The show kicked off with a few local acts. Toronto thrashers Overthrow put on a hell of a performance and it was a great pleasure to finally see them live. The next act was a group called Blessed Death and we weren't digging them at all. I'll never forget after the show Craig drew a comical sketch of them in one of my books.
Craig's artistic rendering of Blessed Death
If memory serves correct Razor played as well and they ripped shit up with their usual brutal onslaught of metal.
The next act was none other than New York rap/metal pioneers Ludichrist, and it was amazing to finally see these guys perform live. Their energy was off the charts and they were just as tight live as they were on record. I had an absolute blast skanking around in the pit for their entire set. I was also super stoked to get a Ludichrist bumper sticker for $2.00, which I immediately put on the lower back portion of my leather jacket. It would remain there until the day my coat died.
Last but not least was the headlining band, one of my favourites who I had missed seeing just a year prior to this... Bay Area Thrash-tech gods Death Angel! They definitely stole the show, their intensity was through the roof! I managed to make it to the stage and performed my first ever stage dive! It was so fun I couldn't help but diving repeatedly throughout the duration of the set. My friends and I were also catapulting each other onto the crowd to do some body surfing. We also got a decent size circle put going. The first few rows of fans were all head bangers, so for fun we kept running, jumping in the air, and crashing into them from behind with brutal body checks.
This was the most fun I had engaged in yet as far as concerts went, and it was this day in particular that The Concert Hall beat out The Siboney Club as my favourite venue to see live music. Driving home in bliss I wondered to myself who I would have the privilege of seeing next at the hall...
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