Paradise Lost / Lacuna Coil / Katatonia
I was aware of the fact that Friday lunchtime /afternoon is not exactly the best time to be driving on the highway to the Netherlands – but I hadn´t expected to be stuck in a chaos caused by weather and traffic jams when I started my drive to Dordrecht. Only a short while before doors opened, I actually arrived at the venue Bibelot, but I was only greeted by a few lonesome fans and not by the expected long queue.
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There was no photopit, and also the general outlook of the new home for the venue was cold and had lost all its charm, when compared to the previous one.
The venue remained rather empty for quite a long time – when Katatonia entered the stage, you could only hope that they toned down the light so the band did not have to face the half empty hall. The Katatonia performance was good, but at the same time nothing special – there were a few fans of the band in the audience, but the rest of the people didn´t really seem to be overly convinced. The songs sounded pretty similar after a while, and joy of playing and power were not that visible with most of the band´s musicians, so that the audience remained rather unaffected.
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It continued with Lacuna Coil who were lucky enough to play in front of a nicer atmosphere, since the venue had filled up by the time they started their performance. Thus, there was a base for a better mood in the audience, and this mood also continued to improve, because the band around singer Cristina Scabbia managed to convince the audience thanks to a diverse and rocking setlist. This enthusiasm and power you could to see on stage infected the crowd and made it participate much more. The atmosphere got better from song to song.
Setlist: I Don´t Believe In Tomorrow / Kill The Lights / Fragments of Faith / Heaven´s A Lie / The Game / Our Truth / Upside Down / Without Fear (sang in Italian) / Swamped / Intoxicated / Trip The Darkness / Spellbound
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The mood got better and better once the main band of the evening entered the stage: Paradise Lost! Their anniversary tour had led them through many bigger venues – and especially because of this, the Bibelot might´ve been a surprising venue for the band – also since the Dutch crowd wasn´t that enthusiastic on that very evening. The setlist consisted of a really good mix of songs from their albums, and the highlights surely were “So much is lost”, „Faith divides us death unites us“, „Tragic Idol“. „Say just words“ and as one of the encores „One second“.
In how far the crowd actually enjoyed the show, I cannot tell – all I can say that at least the first rows had a lot of fun – which was clearly visible – whilst the rows in the back just stood there watching. That was pretty disappointing since the communication between band and audience went surprisingly well, even though singer Nick Holmes often had to try to get the audience going to have any form of enthusiasm to be seen.
Setlist: Mortals Watch The Day / So Much Is Lost / Remembrance / Gothic / Enchantment / Faith Divides Us Death Unites Us / Tragic Idol / Never For The Damned / Isolate / Say Just Words / Rotting Misery / One Second / True Belief / Over The Madness
Conclusion
A concert where the performances as such didn´t give much to complain about – maybe the often lacking communication between the band and the audience, but that is it. The downside nevertheless was the audience, because it seemed as if it didn´t have that much of interest for the concert, and that´s clearly nothing that you´d expect. It´s a pity, because the bands surely would´ve deserved a better mood in the audience!
