VANS OFF THE WALL TOUR WITH

IGNITE

+ SNFU / VENEREA / DEVIATES / POWERHOUSE

Date: April 10^th 2001

Location: Stuttgart, Röhre

The Vans Off The Wall Tour brought these five bands to Stuttgart, so some friends and me decided to go there, mainly because of Ignite and SNFU. When we arrived at the club there were already fans waiting in front of it, but the bands were nowhere to be seen, not even their busses. At first we feared that the show could have been cancelled, but then the club opened its doors and people could go inside of it, so we assumed it wouldn’t be some kind of metal disco going on inside but a cool show instead. Some time later two busses arrived and people were loading out the gear for the bands, set up merchandise tables in the club etc. So the show could begin.

First band that evening were Powerhouse from (I guess) California. They played some kind of old school hardcore, but not that youth crew style I am mainly into. Sometimes they reminded me to Sick of it All, maybe because of their singer who looked similar to Lou Koller. And his voice? Maybe his voice was similar, too, I can’t quite remember. Powerhouse were ok, nothing special, but quite entertaining.

Same for Deviates. I heard they’re on Epitaph Records, but I’m not sure about that. Their music sounded like a mixture of 7 Seconds (especially the backing vocals / melodies) and… aahm… don’t know. See, they were fast and melodic, but nevertheless different compared to all those melodycore bands. Cool.

Third band that night were Venerea from Sweden. Lots of kids, mostly younger ones, seemed to know their songs, because there was lots of stagediving and dancing going on and people sang along to the songs. Venerea were ok, good musicians and stuff, but really nothing that could blow me away. I mean this sound is far from being unique, but hey, did anybody care at all? I don’t think so. Anyway, the kids liked them a lot and apart from Ignite no other band got such huge applause that night.

This meant that SNFU could only lose in comparison to Venerea when it comes to the response from the crowd. Their sound is too complex for the average melodycore fan and I don’t think that the majority of the audience knew their songs. I was quite happy to see them live, because I like their records a lot, and hey, SNFU are definitely a legend, right? The bass player of Venerea thought the same as he stood in the front row and sang along every word. Yeah! SNFU’s vocalist Mr.Chi Pig is really crazy, we talked to him a bit before the show, and he seemed to be a quite normal guy, but on stage he’s really insane when it comes to his strange stage acting and his weird clothes and masks. They played old as well as new songs, among them hits just as ‘Painful reminder’, ‘Eddie Vedder’, ‘Bobbit’ and lots more. I liked them although my camera called it quits during their set.

I was not quite sure if there would be as much movement among the audience when Ignite entered the stage as there had been during Venerea’s set. But the Orange County boys proved me wrong. People were absolutely going crazy, moshing, stagediving and all this kind of stuff. And unfortunately some stupid tough guys. Hey guys, you are boring, why not go the Gym? Ignite played all of their hits, including ‘Ash return’, ‘Man against man’, ‘Embrace’, ‘Taken away’ and of course many songs from their new record ‘A place called home.’ They also did three cover songs, ‘Sunday bloody Sunday” (U2), ‘Banned in D.C.’ (Bad Brains) and of course ‘Screaming for change’ (Uniform Choice). Although a lot of people in the hardcore seem to dislike Ignite, their live show once again was energetic and absolutely powerful. Thumbs up.

(Stefan Münch)