"I'm meant to be up here acting spooky and scary", Manuel Gagneux says, smiling and taking a drink between songs, "but you guys are making it really hard to do that". Gagneux seems genuinely surprised by the turnout, and the noise of the crowd in Dublin, there to witness his band's first headlining Irish show in support of their most recent release "Greif".
He needn't be, such is the cult that has developed around his now six piece group, nine years following the first release under the "Zeal & Ardor" (hereafter referred to as "Z&A") banner, "Devil is Fine", a rough blueprint of what was to follow in the intervening years; slave spirituals, chain gang chants, crushing riffs, and elements of electronica thrown in for good measure.
Rather than the tired and tested trope of metal bands playing classic rock before hitting the stage, Z&A pipe ambient music through the speakers, and smoke onto the stage. The whistled intro to "The Bird, The Lion and The Wildkin" is the que for the sextet to take to the stage, shrouded in hooded robes to start the song proper. As the closing notes ring out, the handclap driven intro to "Wake of a Nation" kicks in, and the song driven by massive open bass notes, thunderous drums, and the voice of Gagneux and his other vocalists (more on them later). Just when you think you've been eased into proceedings, Z&A lob a grenade in the room in the form of "Gotterdammerung", an three minute slab of pure fury from their self titled record.
For the next hour, over twenty one songs, Z&A take the audience on a musical odyssey through their back catalogue. There is respite in songs like the bluesy "Ship on Fire", the understated "To My Ilk", to chant-along numbers like "Devil is Fine", "Gravedigger's Chant", and "Blood in the River". The latter song having a tremendous acapella bridge with the band and the crowd chanting "the river bed will run red with the blood of the saints and the blood of the holy". Cult following, indeed.
"The last three songs are a bit heavy" says Gagneux with a grin, while delivering the understatement of the year, as the band close with at hit trick of unrelenting slabs of metal in the form of "Don't You Dare", "I Caught You" and "Clawing Out". The final song building to the perfect crescendo to end the show; staccato drums, guitar, and electronic sound to beat the audience into submission in the best possible way.
While Z&A is Gagneux's baby as frontman and guitarist, he is extremely ably backed up by a stellar group of musicians. Marco Von Allmen anchors the group with his tight drumming that mixes acoustic drums while utilizing electronic elements to recreate hand claps and chains clinking. Tiziano Volante beefs up Gagneux's guitar with lead and rhythm elements on his 7 string, all the while alternating between headbanging, pinweeling, and staring intensley into the crowd. Lukas Kurmann's chunky bass fills out the low end, and takes the lead in songs like "Sugarcoat" and "Run". On either side of Gagneax on stage are additional vocalists Denis Wagner and Marc Obrist. To use the term "backing vocals" to describe them is doing them a disservice, as they provide a vital part of the visual element of the performance, as well as the layers they add to the songs. Obrist stalks his side of the stage taking the breaks between singing to headband like so many in the crowd. Wagner is a force of nature that commands your attention due to his unpredictability on stage, veering from traditional headbanging, to stomping on stage, to moves that almost fall into the realm of contemporary dance.
It's hard to put into words just how impressive this band are live. Where the first Z&A record was a rock thrown into the metal lake, the band's sound is expanding in a way similar to the way ripples on a still lake would; The set that the band put together was a reflection of that, but no songs feel out of place. Old and new songs sit comfortably beside each other. "Success is fleeting, and we're having the time of our lives" Gagneux says as the show draws to a close. The masses leave the Academy, under the watchful eyes of Phil Lynott, immortalized in the banner adorning the Unite the Union building next door. If you were to suggest on tonight's evidence that Z&A are the best metal band on the go today, very few would disagree.
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