Last Friday, May 2, the RCA Club in Lisbon hosted the tour Slashing Europe headlined by Belgium's Aborted and featuring Brazil's Crypta, USA's The Zenith Passage and New Zealand's Organectomya. We were there to check out this ode to extreme metal at a sold-out RCA with a hostile atmosphere in the best sense of the word!
Organectomy
As agreed, Organectomy took to the stage at 7:50 p.m. punctually, and I confess that I've rarely seen a concert in which the house was already well packed after the first band. With a brutal sound, like all the bands on the night, based on death metal with heavy doses of slam, the audience got off to an early start with an honest circle pit for a band that surprised us and made the doors of the RCA shake.
The Zenith Passage
I confess that I like these tours where four or five bands get together and each one has between 40 and 60 minutes to distil all their talent, and we always get to know new bands that end up on our radar. This was the case with the American band The Zenith Passage who debuted in Portugal with their extremely technical death metal, incorporating progressive influences with highly prepared musicians such as the duo of guitarists who are overwhelming, it should be noted that the band does not have a bass player and yet we don't even notice the lack in this case.
Presenting their latest work from 2023, the album Datalysium, The Zenith Passage naturally dedicated themselves to it, playing at least five tracks in the little over forty minutes of their performance. Of the night's four bands, they were undoubtedly the band with the most complex sound, building cohesive and well-defined layers and atmospheres that fatally attracted the audience, which by now was in full force.
CRYPTA
At 9:25 p.m. the RCA was already buzzing, a lot of people went to check it out CryptaThis Brazilian band, made up exclusively of women, always brings its powerful fusion of brutality, technical precision and striking stage presence. One important detail is that after the concert we learned that the vocalist and bassist Fernanda Lira fell ill during the concert and in the days that followed, something that we honestly didn't feel at any point, given Fernanda's total professionalism and determination.
The girls' concert is always performed with a lot of dedication and charisma, and they started with both feet in the door with the classic "Death Arcana", from their debut album Echoes Of The Soul. With a short set list of 8 tracks, they chose only the most aggressive ones, such as "The Other Side of Anger", "Stronghold" and "The Outsider", all from their second album Shades of Sorrow, released in 2023. This well-crafted blend of classic death metal from the late 80s, with all the modernity and Brazilian roots that the band is known for, gives them a natural personal identity that stands out even more live.
A highlight was the new guitarist Helena Nagagata, who joined the band shortly before the tour and has already mastered not only the technical side, the incredible riffs and solos, but also the posture on stage, as we can see in the spectacular "Under the Black Wings", in which both Helena and Tainá Bergamaschi deliver sensational guitar work. They closed the night with the best-known "From the Ashes", already feeling at home. In one of Fernanda's interactions with the audience, she said "There are two certainties in life, that you will always return to Portugal, and that the Portuguese audience will never disappoint", another absolute truth is that Crypta's concert will also never disappoint, the word of someone who has seen them three times in Portugal.
Aborted
In the midst of the controversy that has raged in recent days, due to the abrupt departure of Ken Bedene, the band's drummer since 2010, who was dismissed for terrible accusations of harassing an underage girl, and the rapid entry of the incredibly talented Kévin Paradis, one of the most respected drummers in European technical death metal, the Belgians took to the stage at the RCA, making it clear that this is all in the past.
A few minutes late, and a completely packed RCA with no room for a needle the Aborted proved a + b why they are one of the greatest death metal bands on this planet. With a dark and gloomy atmosphere and lighting, the band began by unleashing the dogs with two devastating riffs, "Dreadbringer" and "Retrogore", which turned the room into a chaos of brutality with the right to circle pit festivals, stagediving and endless crowsurfing with every blow the Belgian veterans unleashed. "Brotherhood of Sleep" and "Infinite Terror", two more blasts from the great most recent album Vault of Horrors, one of the main highlights of 2024, continued to drive the audience crazy.
Another highlight is Kévin Paradis, who really is an unstoppable and tireless machine, one of today's great drummers, an absolute hit for Aborted. Another highlight is undoubtedly the band's leader, frontman Sven "Svencho" de Caluwé, who shows an overwhelming stage presence and only stops for a few seconds to sip his beer at the end of each song. With a fantastic atmosphere, other blasts such as "From a Tepid Whiff", "Threading on Vermillion Deception" and "Hecatomb" rounded off a night of brutality, aggression and chaos in the best sense of the word, with the audience sweating, ecstatic and giving a standing ovation to the Belgians who delivered everything and more on a memorable night.
Thanks : Hellxis
Artists: Aborted
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