Of course the latter band opened this tour. Battlecross is a melodic death metal/thrash metal band, and, like the other bands that would perform today, from the USA. Although this band doesn’t really stand out if you only listen to the music, they do remind you of a mixture of bands like Kreator, DevilDriver and Chimaira. In my book it’s a compliment to be compared with these bands. What’s the deal with not only this band, but also with the bands listed above, is that all music will sound alike if you are unfamiliar with it. I didn’t know this band, so it seemed like there was some repetition in the songs. Nevertheless, the band really impressed me and I’m looking forward to hear more from them and to see them again. Their performance also resulted in quite some applause and heads banging, so this was a good evening for them!

After this very good beginning of the evening it was time for Miss May I, a band that usually plays quite tightly, but the vocals shift between spot-on to heavily out of tune from song to song. Today wasn’t very different because the band did play quite well, but the vocalist wasn’t steady enough. His microphone problems and the mix of the evening didn’t help either. Because of this mix the vocals disappeared sometimes and because of the microphone problems he wasn’t audible for almost a full song. After some songs, and a small “let’s see how hard we can throw each other around in this room for the pit”, a large part of the crowd was shocked: one member of the crowd was either high on adrenaline or cocaine and found it necessary to punch someone very hard in his face. This fragile guy couldn’t take the punch and hit his head on the stairs in the venue. Therefore, he had to go to the hospital and the other guy talked with the police and security and was probably also taken away because we didn’t see him anymore. Because I was standing outside a lot to check what was going on  I missed the rest of Miss May I, but I will probably be able to see them again sometime this year.

After a somewhat odd evening until that point, it was time for the headliner of the evening. They brought a new decor of course, which somewhat reminded me of their last show in 013, but a little smaller. Trivium started off with a new song from their latest record: “Brave This Storm”, which was followed by a much older song: “Like Light To The Flies”. The energy from both the band and the crowd was amazing and it was the best mosh pit I’ve been in for a long time. Everybody was having a good time, laughing and making new friends, which wasn’t expected after the previous band. After the songs “No Way To Heal”, “Strife”, ”Shattering The Skies Above”, and “Through Blood And Dirt And Bone” it was time for a live premiere. Trivium had never played “Of All These Yesterdays” live before, but Amsterdam had the premiere tonight. Of course it was expected that they would play “Becoming The Dragon” and “A Gunshot To The Head Of Trepidation”, but it wasn’t expecting that they would play the full 12 minutes of the song “Shogun”.

After this song, and this very strong set of well-chosen and well-played songs, it was time for a small interlude, which resulted in the last two songs of the set. After the well-known songs “In Waves” and “Pull Harder On The Strings Of Your Martyr” this lovely evening came to an end. The only thing that’s left for me to say is that this band still becomes better and better and that it’s definitely a band you should keep an eye on if they are near you. I will definitely go to one of their shows again, and I hope it will be quite soon!