Iron Maiden-Rock in India
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This article may have explicit content and is not meant to hurt anyone’s feelings. All I am doing is being honest about my feelings and experience of the events that happened.
Moshing is an act of celebration in heavy metal culture and is not intended to cause injuries. Individuals who get injured are helped and comforted by the same people who indulge in this activity.
It was the 15th of February. Was it a Sunday? No! It was the Iron Maiden Day! All of us woke up with just one thought in mind, “Iron Maiden Live!” Friends started pouring into our house as we prepared ourselves for the evening that we would remember the most, throughout our lives. We freshened, wore our black Iron Maiden T-shirts, got rid of our accessories, clicked photographs and set out for lunch. We were a group of eleven guys walking on the road and definitely we were noticed by many, probably as a group into notorious blasphemy.
We reached the venue (Palace grounds, Bangalore) at half past two and successfully devised ideas to smuggle cigarettes past the security check, shopped for a few accessories at the official “Rock in India” merchandise and entered the concert arena. What we see is a huge crowd beyond our imagination, cheering the band playing on stage, which meant that we were slightly late. There were two stages set up; one was for all the newer bands and the bigger stage for the Iron Maiden, Parikrama and Lauren Harris. A total of ten bands including Iron Maiden were slated to perform. The sun was scorching but it meant nothing to us as we plunged into the wave of heavy metal. Following is of what I, and probably most of us felt about the bands that performed.
The Vonamor band: This one was supposed to be an amateur band. We missed this one as were late and I have nothing much to say about them.
CRI Winner: The name is “AbraXas” from Pune, winners of the Campus Rock battle. They sounded like a metalcore outfit heavily influenced by “Lamb of God”. I must say that they are a bunch of young talent and definitely had the crowd moshing and head-banging.
Synaps: They are the Bangalore based alternative metal band. They started with a cover of “Rage against the Machines” and that didn’t impress at all. Next was a cover of “Pearl Jam” which sounded a lot better. They followed it with a couple of their own compositions and finished with a “Korn” cover. Overall their performance was average.
Cyanide Serenity: They are a UK based band very new in the Death Metal scene. The frontman seemed to hate George Bush for some reason and constantly abused him, called him Fing Ct, shouted “F* Bush” and even had the crowd do the same. They played just 3 tracks and had all of us moshing from the word go. That’s what you call metal, very impressive!
Kryptos:Kryptos are a Bangalore based Heavy\Thrash metal band and have been playing since a long time. They played their own compositions and sounded wonderful. They are for sure one of India’s good metal bands.
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