Pieni’s Highlights of 2014
I’ve been to a lot, but really A LOT of amazing shows this year. But the top-5 wasn’t that hard to choose:
- Sonic Syndicate at Zakk (Düsseldorf)
- The End Of Grace at Valand (Gothenburg)
- Skid Row at The Underworld (London)
- R.A.M.P. at Canecas (Paços de Ferreira)
- Equaleft at Metalpoint (Porto)
The downside of attending so many shows is that I lack the time to pay attention to all new releases. Here are the five to which I did pay loads of attention:
- “Sonic Syndicate” by Sonic Syndicate
- “Ghost Empire” by Caliban
- “Adapt & Survive” by Equaleft
- “Vol. 5 – Lost At Home” by More Than A Thousand
- “Circle” by Sparzanza
Believe it or not, it was the top videos that gave me a hard time. Despite the lyric video trend, which has also improved graphically (next year I might even come up with a top 5 of those), it’s nice to see that there are still so many videos with such visual impact:
- “House Of The Rising Sun” by Five Finger Death Punch
- “All The Devil’s Toys” by Deathstars
- “Riskbreaker” by BatAAr
- “Five Minutes” by The Defiled
- “To Hell And Back” by Sabaton
Now the anticipations for this new year that starts tomorrow:
- The End Of Grace – we all know how plans fail, especially when it comes to a new band, so the debut album that they were hoping to release this year was postponed to 2015. So here they are again, topping my expectations.
- Through The Cracks – definitely waiting eagerly for this one! And now that singer Tillie Grundel has left, the curiosity is even bigger.
- Web – despite my close relationship with this band, it’s all been hush-hushed and I have no idea what’s coming out of there. But I’m sure it will be great.
- Hills Have Eyes – it shouldn’t be long until “Antebellum” hits the stores!
- Hardcore Superstar – anything that comes from these sleazy bastards is worth it, 10th album or not.
Happy 2015 people!
Renata “Pieni” Lino
Valkyrian Music 
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