Behemoth - Gig Review 27th November @ The Triffid, Bris QLD

Behemoth
The Triffid, Brisbane QLD
November 27, 2023
Support: Golgothan Remains, Resin Tomb

With the night sky filled with lightning and lined-up punters lashed with rain, it’s an aptly grim evening in Brisbane as The Triffid plays host to Behemoth’s first date of their clutch of Australian shows. The most extreme act on the stacked and diverse Good Things lineup, tonight serves as both the unholy Polish outfit’s first Australia show since 2019 – and first headliner in the QLD city in almost a decade. Despite the poor weather, the blackened Brisbane masses have shown up big time, with anticipation at a fever pitch on the back of the modern day legend’s excellent new LP Opvs Contra Natvram and their powerhouse live show.

As The Triffid already starts filling near to capacity, local openers Resin Tomb get a strong response across their brief 20 minute showing. A last minute call up to replace Munt, who are victims of last minute flight cancellations, the Brisbane dissonant death metallers take their opportunity with both hands and put on a hell of a set. The WoS favs sound packs in unnerving open-string riffs and larynx-ripping roars over furious drum work, with titanic moments of half-time grooves flattening The Triffid crowd. With their showing raised up even further with a great mix, performance highpoints ‘Unconsecrated‘ and ‘Ascendancy‘ show why the Brisbane five piece are quickly gaining traction in the local and international extreme metal world.

Another one of Australia’s best current death metal exports, Golgothan Remains’ national support slot on the Behemoth sideshows sees the Sydney-siders get to stretch out their legs with a 40 minute slot. Sadly, while Resin Tomb’s mix was both punchy and cutting, Golgothan Remains’ sound is frustrating throughout – only the drums sound strong, with the intricate guitar work buried deep behind the grainy bass tone. Fortunately the diehards up the front care little, with the pit kicking into gear, goaded on by the hardworking frontman Matthieu Van den Brande. Focusing heavily on their excellent 2022 album Adorned in Ruin, the quartet’s usage of evil mood definitely keeps them from falling into the generic old-school worship plague by a lot of their contemporaries. Tonight though is not the best advertisement for Golgothan Remains powers, with the poor mix doing the band no favours, and by the end of their set it feels like it’s dragged on a song or two too long.

With the combination of a packed venue and high-percentage humidity giving The Triffid’s air conditioning a workout, the anticipation for Behemoth’s arrival is near fever pitch. Undeniably one of the most influential and highly touted metal artists of the turn of the century, the Nergal-led unit has grown into one the extreme metal world’s most well-oiled live groups. As the theatrical opening of ‘Post-God Nirvana‘ moves into The Satanist’s ‘Ora Pro Nobis Lucifer‘, the Brisbane crowd is already lapping up every the band has on offer, matching the blackened king’s energy with far more gusto than should be available on a rainy Monday evening.

With the live sound thankfully much stronger for our headliners, Behemoth pull plenty of material from their latest LP Opvs Contra Natvram and their classic The Satanist – though only ‘Bartzabel‘ from 2018’s I Loved You At Your Darkest gets aired. Older cut ‘No Sympathy For Fools’ gets ‘dedicated’ to cancel culture, while the rampaging ‘Daimonos’ shows the band off at their most visceral and furious. The fist-pumping intro of ‘Blow Your Trumpets Gabriel‘ gets the biggest reaction of the show, whereas the crushing and atmosphere driven ‘Versvs Christvs‘ is as immense live as it is on record. The epic centrepiece shows Behemoth at their most experimental, perfectly dipping their into the darkened gothic waters with piano and baritone vocals, before climaxing with trem-picked riffs and bombastic drum work. While the instrument-beating, bible-destroying Nergal is clearly the group’s focal point, drummer Inferno easily lives up to his reputation as one of the best players today. He doesn’t pummel his gigantic kit senselessly like many of his peers, rather using feel and dynamics to push the music along; the relentless march of ‘Ov Fire and The Void’ a perfect example of his amazing playing.

With the circle-pits fired up for the perennial Behemoth main-set-closer ‘Chant for Eschaton 2000’, the evening climaxes with the encore of ‘O Father O Satan O Sun!’. The closer of the immense Satanist record, Behemoth‘s masterful usage of a drawn-out feedback break, before launching into it’s enormous, stone-faced outro, is the sign of a live band at the peak of their strengths. Behemoth have truly put on a ‘huge show in an intimate venue’ performance tonight in The Triffid, thanks to an attitude that confidently straddles the line of uber-professionalism and highly passionate. A pessimist could argue that the Polish punishers have sacrificed a notch of brutality in favour of a more ambitious and consistent live show, but the diverse crowd of metal fans that have had their heads blown off for the last 75 minutes could care little. A must-watch at the upcoming  Good Things Festival dates, Behemoth‘s air-tight, emboldened performance at The Triffid tonight proves that there is no sign of their reign ending at the top of the extreme metal heap.

Gig review by Andrew Kapper @andrew_kapper

Setlist

Post‐God Nirvana
Ora Pro Nobis Lucifer
Malaria Vvlgata
Conquer All
The Deathless Sun
Blow Your Trumpets Gabriel
Once Upon a Pale Horse
Daimonos
Versvs Christvs
Ov Fire and the Void
Bartzabel
No Sympathy for Fools
Chant for Eschaton 2000

Encore

O Father O Satan O Sun!