Live reviews

Helsingør Festival, Helsingør Denmark 8/12/05
(Bjorn Svin, Dozer, New Artless Creatures, Nutra, Kussekannibalerne)

By Scott

Tom and I made the 45km drive from Copenhagen to the Musikhuset Elværket. The Musikhuset is basically a brink barn with a side room about the size of Stengade so you can have two stages with bands playing back and forth. It was mostly the young punk and alternative people of this part of Denmark at the festival. I guess there were maybe 250 people at the maximum. Good and cheap beer and only 80kr to get in or 200 for the 3 days. The first band we heard was Nutra on the larger stage in the brick barn and they were some sort of Indie rock. The singer was very good. It was not our sort of thing. Next up was New Artless Creatures. Tom and I had seen them last year but this is a power trio that has really matured and they rocked like hell! The drummer has incredible energy and hits the drums hard (he broke his bass pedal in half during the last song before the encore!) and a bit like Keith Moon. The bass player lays down some cool grooves for the guitarist and singer. They were really cool. A bit psychy at times but mostly like MC5 meets Ten Years After or something. A cool cover of 5 to 1 by the Doors was mixed into the encore jam. The band is in the middle of mixing songs they recorded in the studio for a CD. This I want to hear!

Kussekannibalerne, a local punk band, and clearly the one most people had been waiting for as they were selling cheap shirts and loads of people were wearing them. This was pretty much young kids playing punk rock and not that well. They were having fun and the crowd was into it, so a great way to spend a Friday night!

Dozer, had driven for 7 hours to get to this place tonight and it looked like no one would see them but as soon as they started to play, the room filled in with dancing people and the groove took off. The band pretty much played the same exact set as we saw them play back in May with Mastadon but they played extra songs for another 20 minutes (60 in total) which was cool. We got to hear 4 new songs and based on these I think these guys are probably making their best record yet. While, Nebula are the US's hardest working stoner rock band, Dozed must be Europe's, as these guys tour a lot and play hard and are totally dedicated to the groove they create. A powerful and cool live band. We did not hang out to see Bjorn Svin, as it was already 2:30 and I had to drive back home. Overall, a fun night!