Cradle of Filth/Satyricon/Septic Flesh (live review)

“Nothing is more revolting than the majority; for it consists of few vigorous predecessors, of knaves who accommodate themselves, of weak people who assimilate themselves, and the mass that toddles after them without knowing in the least what it wants”

- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Before arriving in Norfolk, Virginia, I had been shuffled around airport to airport in order to attend Satyricon and Cradle of Filth’s second-to-last show at the tail end of February 2009. Airports are a lonely portal stuffed with those who simply exist; people with temporary destinations and complicated itineraries to follow. Rarely do you see anybody conversing with anybody when in retrospect; patrons should take this opportunity to meet their neighboring citizens, to learn about where they came from, and to share where they are going. Instead, you experience a brisk, uninviting atmosphere, where people keep their conversations as short and tight as their collared shirts choking their necklines. I must have passed every stiff and emotionless American crammed in Chicago’s Midway airport, while they kept their, bitter hardened thoughts reserved behind their wandering eyes. You won’t tap into any friendly coffee shop vibe and bullshit jive waiting in any U.S. airport. Only hurried hustlers and cramp corporate rustlers wade here. Airports are a pit stop full of pricey peddlers, food courts and interactive, internet meddlers living their lives on standby. Plus, how could I form much more of an opinion than this? I too, took the notion not to speak, unless spoken too. It’s not my most memorial experience, but in order for the real sin to begin, it’s temporarily manageable.

The Norva is located in downtown Norfolk,Virginia, pronounced, “Nahfick” to the locals. It’s a waterlogged, port city surrounded by rivers and channels of it’s neighboring city Portsmouth, while residing on the coast of the Atlantic Ocean. It’s the sister city of Norway, which made all the more sense for the black Norwegian, industrialized metal entourage, Satyricon to temporarily stake out their concert. Satyr impaled the audience with his pitch fork microphone, with songs like “Now, Diabolical” and black hymns off their new album, “The Age of Nero”. Now, several have argued that Satyricon haven’t earned their Black Metal wings yet, but this source usually comes from some trivial fan boy, with nothing better to do than exhaust you with their irrelevant, metal philosophy. On the other horns, Satyricon was the one standing on the heightened stage at horned-salutation in front the five hundred lost goth souls who paid $25.00 ea to watch Dani Filth chirp like an fiddle out of tune. Suffice to say, Satyricon announced their headlining tour for fall 2009. Beforehand, we were blessed by opening guests, Septic Flesh from Athens, Greece who reached into the pit of their guttural vocal cords to bring us ripened, flesh, writhing death-driven lyrics. Hands and horns down, Septic Flesh and Satyricon obliterated Cradle off the stage. At one point and time, I might have admitted to being a COF fan in my life, but those days are as outdated as those baggy Hot Topics pants I pitched in the burn barrel after my eighteenth birthday. Anymore, I wouldn’t be caught dead listening to Cradle Of Filth, while their stage production was a bigger let down than the much anticipated return of Siegfried and Roy. I was practically pulse-less as a stomached the first song or two, but eventually made off with my own disappearing act and wound up meeting Frost back at the merch table.

Over-all I couldn’t help but possessing that same hollowed feeling that overcame me back at the airport, but this time surrounded by meaningless, lost goth souls with no where else to go, but HELL, and just as the entertainers before them have in store.

~Smutstrutter