Here to stay – Hellsinki Metal Festival 9.-10.8.2024, Part 2/2

The second day of Hellsinki Metal Festival 2024 opened with Demoniac, a blackened thrash metal band from Chile. As is to be expected from a concert beginning at half past one in the afternoon, Demoniac got to play to a meagre crowd of metalheads fresh out of their lairs. The group accepted the challenge with gusto, however, and delivered a powerful performance of 45 minutes. Besides guitars, vocals and drums the quartet utilized even some wind instrumentation in their output. Singer-guitarist Javier Ortiz put up an especially powerful performance, and the entire band received well-deserved respect and sympathy from the crowd for flying halfway across the world to play in Finland. 

Out in the sun, Humanity’s Last Breath kicked off the festivities on the festival’s main stage. The Swedish deathcore group put their instruments to devastating use, so much so that their crushing sound seemed to choke the very air out of your lungs. The band did not let the mood lighten up with speeches between the songs, opting instead to power through to the end with minimal breaks. A commanding performance, if not quite my cup of tea. 

Back indoors, Helsótt from southern California shared their folkish death metal to a crowd of a few hundred, maybe. Unfortunately Helsótt’s gig stands out as the weekend’s low point for me, as their alcohol-glorifying and cumbersome brand of metal just didn’t land for me at the time. Furthering the awkward feel of the show was the musicians’ incessant begging for people to visit their merch desk. I understand that the costs of travel can be high, especially for smaller bands, but at a certain point nagging for people to buy your stuff just brings the mood down. 

Out on the main stage, Blackbraid was a decent enough palate cleanser after Helsótt. An hour’s worth of atmospheric black metal and no annoying speeches in between? I’ll take it. Formed in February 2022, Blackbraid has made a name for itself in a very short time, and their show at Hellsinki metal festval last weekend proves there is bite as much as bark in their output. On the second outdoor stage, Insomnium executed with a sure hand. Their masterful mix of melancholy, melody and death metal worked its way into the listener’s soul as reliably as always. Insomnium has seen some changes in its crew as of late, with the departure of Jani Liimatainen and entrance of Tomy Laisto as a touring guitarist. This shuffle has not impacted the band’s live performance noticeably, and the set’s closing tune “Heart Like a Grave” sounded with such force as to make it to the top of my favorite Insomnium songs.

The day continued with traditional German heavy metal as Doro conquered the main stage after Insomnium. The thirteen-song setlist consisted of six Warlock covers, one Judas Priest-cover, and six tracks from Doro’s solo career. An active singer since the early 1980’s, Doro performed with easygoing authority and held the attention and respect of those gathered. Within the Ice Hall, I caught the last minutes of the set of Barathrum, and quickly hoped I’d been there earlier. By some inexplicable magic, Barathrum had drawn enough people to fill the Ice Hall almost to capacity. People were standing in the hallway blocking the entrances to the seats, and on the floor a joyous moshpit went on for most of the proceedings. Barathrum truly captured the hearts and minds of the Hellsinki crowd, and I just might have to take a closer look at this group to see what’s what about them.

Fans of Immortal and its former lead vocalist Abbath were in for a treat as the latter took to the Hellsinki 02-stage to perform songs of his former band. Ten timeless Immortal-classics were heard, not least among them tunes such as “Damned in Black” and “The Call of the Wintermoon“. Abbath’s infernal performance was enhanced by the use of pyrotechnics that blazed up from the stage in timely places. Local band Tyrantti was responsible for one of the most curious performances of the weekend. I couldn’t quite get a handle on this band’s intentions and lore during their 45-minute set. All I know is that corpse paint, clean singing, melodic heavy metal and wrestling men were involved. Here is definitely one band to look out for in the future. 

On the main stage, the heavier than heavy djenting of Meshuggah signaled the beginning of the end of the festival. These Swedes have produced two albums in their career that I like from front to back, “ObZen” and “Koloss”, and I’ve come to accept I’ll never fully understand the pull of this band. Fortunately, however, there were thousands at the festival better versed in Meshuggah than me, and the band serenaded them with twelve hypnotizing tunes that were accompanied by equally psychedelic stage lights. Meshuggah’s show spilled into overtime, which had me worried that Hammerfall might have to shorten their set in response. Hammerfall was for me one of the most anticipated acts of the festival, and their thirteen-song set of uplifting melodic power metal didn’t disappoint. Vocalist Joacim Cans was in a jovial mood, and in addition to flawless singing he humored the crowd with lighthearted chatting between the songs. 

The festival-Saturday’s sold-out attendance became especially noticeable as the evening wore on, and during Kreator’s set there were few places to escape to from the rush of people. This is not to say that Kreator wouldn’t have deserved their massive attendance, for the German thrash metal titans delivered a show that was a truly worthy closing statement for the two-day event. Sixteen songs of one absolute banger after another, amazing stage props and an inferno of pyrotechnics made Kreator’s concert a violent wonder to behold. To top everything off, the hordes that had amassed in front of the main stage were very much in the mood for a violent revolution, judging by the multitude of moshpits, wall-of-deaths and even crowdsurf attempts throughout the show. Over the years, Kreator has performed in Finland’s capital over a dozen times, and last Saturday’s gig at Hellsinki festival ranks among the finest of those shows.

It was my firm intention to finish the festival with Mayhem, the last act of the weekend, but in a tragicomic turn of events I lost my earplugs right before their turn. I made a valiant effort to withstand the deafening cacophony for a few songs, but when Mayhem’s sonic assault offered me nothing but earache I understood it was time to call it quits. Despite the less than optimal ending, my overall impression of the weekend was very positive. Some points for improvement I did notice, such as the lack of sitting spots outside. Additionally, it would be great if the standing floor of the icehall had more entrances besides the one furthest from the stage. Furthermore, the bouncers at the venue should take better care not to let people block the entrances to the ice hall seats. Finally, the second outdoor stage should be a little bit bigger to allow better visibility for more spectators. Aside from a few negative points, it is readily apparent why Hellsinki metal festival has gained such popularity in so short a time, and further success for the feast is an easy prediction to make.

Photos: Kai Lukander

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