Insomnium, Tribulation
Hard Club, Porto (PT)
9th April 2018
Promoted by Prime Artists
“Winter’s Gate” is the name of Insomnium’s latest album and therefore the name of the tour – even if the release is one-year-and-a-half old. Plus, given the cold wave that’s been washing over Europe when Spring was supposed to be settling in, “Winter’s Gate” sounds pretty fitting.
Monday night, the crisp weather, the 2-band bill instead of the usual 3, the ticket price somewhat higher than normal… I confess I was expecting a poor crowd in terms of numbers. Well sometimes it feels good to be wrong and see that, after all these years, your hometown can still positively surprise you.
What I didn’t like to be wrong about was the duration of Tribulation’s gig. Sure, I knew this wasn’t a co-headlining tour, but since there was no other band on the bill, I was hoping for a little more than 45 minutes – especially when they have a new album to promote as well. “Down Below” was released in January and only a third of its fantastic tracks were performed – “Lady Death”, “Nightbound” and “The Lament”. Of course we wanted to hear everything else they’ve played, from their previous works, but we wanted more – hence the 45-minute slot not being enough. I remember the first time Insomnium played here, eight years ago, asking us to buy something at the merch stand in order to “help the little guys”. Here they were this night, not so little anymore, so let’s cross fingers that next time Tribulation come here they’ll be headlining their own show. And that it won’t take that long – even if there’s only 5 years left to complete the 8 since the first time they’ve played in Porto.
The “Down Below” artwork is in shades of red and black but the lights during Tribulation gig were green. And black. Too much black. It was pretty hard to capture those enthralling movements of Jonathan and the devilish faces of Adam; but then again, no still image can truly show what one experiences at a Tribulation gig.
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The darkness came back in full when the Police Academy theme echoed – Insomnium’s intro – but then went on. And on and on. There were only glimpses of a weak light during the whole performance of “Winter’s Gate” (in case you don’t know, the new album has just one 40-minute-long track, divided in 6 parts, although the second, “The Golden Wolf”, is subdivided in two). If the idea was to illustrate the long winter nights they have in Finland, congratulations, you’ve made it! Wasn’t the spirited vibrancy of their performance – and the matching feedback from the crowd – and it would’ve been pretty depressing.
After Insomnium closed their winter’s gate, “The Primeval Dark” lived up to the exact opposite of its name and the room lit up like a summer day. By then I had retreated to enjoy songs like “Mortal Share”, “Weather The Storm” or “The Promethean Song” in the far back – so no bright pics, sorry.
The photographer in me left the venue frustrated, but the music lover had her heart full – and a pleasant smile for the first chords of Moonspell’s “Alma Mater” that preceded the encore “Only One Who Waits”.
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Text & photos by Renata “Pieni” Lino
but they’re also one of my favorite melodic metal bands of all time. That same powerful feeling I experienced from listening to the albums was also portrayed in their live show. Starting their set with the song Inertia, their beautiful riffs paired with their low and enticing vocals created a serene but dark atmosphere that was just absolutely captivating. They also played Down With the Sun which is off my favorite album from them, Across the Dark, but most of their set was relatively newer songs. They had a slower set, but I believe they played the best out of everyone that night. It’s hard to keep a crowd’s attention when playing songs that are not as upbeat, but Insomnium did an excellent job at setting a more somber mood without losing the focus of the audience.
Last time I saw Alestorm, I did not really get to enjoy their set due to the amount of crazy, drunken pirate fans that literally kept throwing themselves on top of me trying to climb their way onto the stage. However, after being able to watch them, Alestorm’s set was so upbeat that there were people in the pits who were literally dancing and skipping around! They played a bunch of fan favorites such as Keelhauld, Captain Morgan’s Revenge, and Leviathan, and the crowd couldn’t help but break out singing very loudly and drunkly to Nancy the Tavern Wench. The keyboards and keytar mixed with talk about squids and other pirate banter made the crowd pumped and ready for Epica’s set.
Valkyrian Music 