Article: METAL ALLEGIANCE 9/17/15

Manipulation sucks. Lets explain why. When you name your band after a song from your album and screw with peoples heads. Its EVIL! and very surprising in a positive way. The nights opening band AKA “Space Born Killers” was no other than Crobot themselves. I have seen this band FOUR TIMES this year and THREE INSTANCES I have spent photographing them. They have toured with Volbeat & Anthrax, Wilson, Motorhead and Anthrax and now a special opening slot for the night here. Talk about a band in high gear cause they seem to be in the right places at the right time. Their album, “Something Supernatural” was released on October 2014 under Wind-up records. I urge you to check this album out and if you catch them live, see them more than once. TRUST ME!

Metal Allegiance at Best Buy Theater was a HUGE event. Not since Metal Masters 4 in Gramercy Theater did the city such a star studded event. With the exclusion of Kerry King, Billy Sheehan and an absent Phil Anselmo, Metal Allegiance is what you would normally expect from a lineup and show like this. The covers performed mixed in with music from the new album (which was released the next day on Friday September 18th), kept the nice and packed crowd of 500+ appeased. With photographers allowed three songs in the pit and the rest of the show we got to shoot in the crowd. The D’Adarrio crew were filming and shooting photos inside the pit but it didn’t bother me so much. When you have six to eight people on stage at a time, you have to do your best to get as much attention as possible involving everyone. The crowd was very easy to work with for the most part as I bobbed and weaved through sections of the show so people wouldn’t be pissed off at me. With the absence of Phil Anselmo and Troy Saunders of Mastodon, Doyle was the only special guest to play the stage. The best part of that however, was watching the couple of Doyle and Alissa White-Guiz of Arch Enemy get to perform together on stage. Something that has never happened before as long as they have been together. Its moments like that worth capturing and witnessing as the happiness of METAL spread through the night. Check the photos down below and the set-list. Also, down below is the new music video from Metal Allegiance. Check it out too!

Crobot Photos:

Metal Allegiance Photos:

Metal Allegiance Set-list:

    1.    Fast as a Shark (Accept cover)
2.    The Green Manalishi (With the Two Prong Crown) 
(Fleetwood Mac cover)
3.    Invaders 
(Iron Maiden cover)
4.    March of the S.O.D 
(S.O.D. cover)
5.    Sargent ‘D’ and the S.O.D. 
(Stormtroopers of Death cover)
6.    Freddy Krueger 
(Stormtroopers of Death cover)
7.    Can’t Kill the Devil 
(Live debut)
8.    Refuse/Resist 
(Sepultura cover)
9.    Territory 
(Sepultura cover)
10.    Dying Song 
(Live debut)
11.    Into the Void 
(Black Sabbath cover)
12.    Got to Choose 
(KISS cover)
13.    Balls to the Wall 
(Accept cover)
14.    Scars 
(Live debut)
15.    Run To The Hills 
(Iron Maiden cover)
16.    Last Caress 
(Misfits cover)
17.    Runnin’ With the Devil 
(Van Halen cover)
18.    Eruption 
(Van Halen cover)
19.    You Really Got Me 
(The Kinks cover)
20.    Lights Out 
(UFO cover)
21.    Overkill 
(Motörhead cover)
22.    Pledge Your Allegiance 
(Live debut)
23.    Whiplash 
(Metallica cover)
24.    Iron Maiden 
(Iron Maiden cover)

             Encore:
26.    We Rock 
(Dio cover)
27.    Cold Gin 
(KISS cover)
28.    Seek & Destroy 
(Metallica cover)

METAL ALLEGIANCE “WE ROCK” VIDEO

Catch you rockers on the flip side!

–Derek–