Opening act tonight were Greece’s STRIKELIGHT, whom we had seen once before already, at the Ragnarock festival in Holland, earlier this year. This quintet surely isn’t the most original band around, but they are very passionate about their music. Heavily influenced by everything 1980’s metallic, the N.W.O.B.H.M. movement in special, these guys always manage to convince me. Once again the emphasis today was on their selftitled debut CD (Eat Metal Records, 2004), by means of 8 out of the 9 songs; only ballad Undying Love was not performed, which was fine by me. A new tune (Running Blind?) was displayed as well. And, not surprisingly, they ended their 48’ set with a covertune : not PICTURE’s Heavy Metal Ears this time, but the even better Singing Swords, courtesy of HEAVY LOAD of course. STRIKELIGHT sure managed to capture a lot of people’s attention, and not just the Greek Armada! The release of more material would be the next logical step for this entertaining band from Hellas.

Announced as being their final farewell gig, I sure didn’t want to miss EMERALD on this occasion. Even more so because I never had a chance to see these guys live before, even though they hail from our Northern neighbours of Holland. EMERALD only released one LP (Down Town) in the mid 1980’s, which was re-released on CD as Iron On Iron by Iron Glory Records several years ago already. I must say that I’m quite fond of that release, although I’ll be the first to admit that vocalist Bert Kivits is a prime example of a love-him-or-hate-him singer. I’m sure not everybody will be fond of his very high-pitched voice. On the other hand, I’m sure that EMERALD’s brand of 1980’s Euro-metal has the potential to please plenty of people. Which was quite obvious by watching the frontrows tonight. Not just the Dutch and Greek fans went bezerk, but quite a couple of other nationalities as well, including a pair of Belgians. Of course most of today’s set was culled from Down Town (Iron On Iron); no less than eight songs, including highlights (and opening tune) Johnny’s On The Run, Shadows Of Allmighty and the closing trio consisting of Iron On Iron, Hell Racer & D-Day. Another highlight, Suicide, preceeded these three, and marked the arrival of an extra guitarist : former HAMMERHAWK member Paul Van Rijswijk. And to top things of, two ‘new’ tunes were performed as well : Robin Hood & Back To The Future. And chances are that we’ll get to hear those and a bunch of other previously unreleased songs on CD pretty soon, as the band has decided to give EMERALD another shot, including Paul. Something I can only applaud to, based on this scorching 50’ set!

I can’t say that Germany’s POWERGOD are one of my fave bands, not even when it comes to German bands only, but both of their covertunes CD’s are really well worth checking out. A real flashback to the 1980’s! And as tonight’s show was going to be a covers only one, I was really looking forward to see what they were capable of in a live situation. METAL CHURCH’s anthem was followed by EXCITER’s Long Live The Loud and ANTHRAX’s Madhouse. All very much to the enthusiasm of the crowd. Unfortunately one drunk (Finnish?) guy decided to jump into the audience once Madhouse was completed, only to find out that there wasn’t anyone to catch him. He probably didn’t know anyhow, but I’m sure that must’ve hurt. Not that I feel sorry for the guy; do like most of us do : stay sober, and then you’ll know what to do and, especially, what not to do. Such as jumping unto a concrete floor. But, I have to say that putting (leaving) a staircase in front of the stage wasn’t the smartest idea, and I wonder why it took several more songs before the security decided to remove those stairs. Maybe it wouldn’t be bad to have some kind of fence in between the stage and the audience, just like at the festival, in order to avoid future casualties. Anyhow, POWERGOD proceeded with HALLOW’S EVE’s Metal Merchants, the commercial sing-along Stars and MANOWAR’s Kill With Power. Then RAVEN’s John Gallagher joined the band on stage and we all knew that Mind Over Matter would be next. Which sounded great, with John only having to focus on co-singing. Up next was MALMSTEEN’s I Am A Viking, followed by two LOUDNESS tunes : Heavy Chains and Esper. I was kinda hoping for ANVIL’s Motormount (with Lips) or OMEN’s Deathrider (with Kevin Goocher) as well, but in stead we were treated to WARLOCK’s Burning The Witches. Which sounded a bit odd, with the male vocals. But that doesn’t mean that POWERGOD’s set was bad. I know that some people won’t like bands covering other bands, but as far as I’m concerned it all relates to which songs are being revamped. And just that is POWERGOD’s strength, as I’m sure most in the audience on this occasion will agree with.

Undisputed headliners tonight were Canadian quartet ANVIL. It had been a while since the last full-fledged European ANVIL tour, but this one sure made up for it. Rather than to focuss on the recent Back To Basics release, the setlist turned out to be nothing short of a sort of best of. No complaints here. After all, the likes of March Of The Crabs, 666, School Love, Winged Assassins, Motormount and Forged In Fire, the sextet that kicked off tonight’s show, are all pure ANVIL classics. Smokin’ Green couldn’t be forgotten either, and Bottom Feeder (‘dedicated’ to the band’s record company, Massacre) was the only tune off Back To Basics. Other more recent stuff followed in form of Race Against Time and White Rhino. The latter included Robb Reiner’s obligatory drumsolo, but in all honesty, killer drummers of his calibre don’t need this kind of stuff in order to convince people. The man’s entire performance in itself is enough! Another crowd favourite, Blood On The Ice, was up next, and was followed by the ‘weakest’ song of them all : Mad Dog. Not entirely hopeless, but it’s just that it sounds so different (more like Ted Nugent) than most of the band’s material. Metal On Metal, the international metal anthem, marked the end of a great, albeit too short, show. Of course they had to return once more, as an ANVIL gig without Mothra wouldn’t be an ANVIL show to begin with! And of course Lips jumped into the audience once again, and sang through his guitar. I know, it’s all been done before, but it still remains entertaining. Furthermore it was quite obvious that all four members had a great time on stage, an attitude that reflected on the audience, and resulted in a good interaction. So, after 77’ it was all over, but we were already looking forward to the next Thursday, when ANVIL would be back on Belgian territory. A very comforting thought!

Nothing much I can add. If you’ve read the above review, you’ll come to the same conclusion as me : this probably was the best (overall) Keep It True warm-up show so far. Great bands, excellent atmosphere, better sound than last time, sold out venue, … The only thing that could’ve been (and should be) better is the safety issue regarding potential stagedivers getting hurt, which I explained earlier on already. Other than that : no complaints whatsoever! And yes : I doubt whether next edition’s warm-up show, including HIRAX and DRIFTER plus two more bands still to be announced, will be able to compete with this Night Of The Blade edition.