Kerrang! – July 12, 2019

KERRANG! 75

JACOBY

SHADDIX

(VOCALS)

How was the show for you?

“Oh, it was fucking top-notch. I

knew it was going to be a good

one when I stepped onstage and

after the start of the first song

I was just pouring sweat. I was

like, ‘Oh, it’s going to be one of

//these/ shows!’ It was insanely

hot, and by the end of the gig I

think we wore the crowd out!”

Do you still look forward to

getting on stage?

“Oh yeah. About two hours

before we go on I always hit

this low point. But then an hour

before, when I’ve got my gig

clothes on and got my head

right, it’s like I’ve hit a switch and

I’m ready to rage. No matter

how I feel or what’s going on in

my life, it’s freedom up there - it

just puts me in the moment.”

Are people buzzing off the new

songs?

“People are <loving> the new

songs. It’s the first time we’ve

played them in the UK and

people are really feeling it. It

adds a dynamic and an ebb and

flow to the set, because I love

playing the classics, but I really

love playing new stuff. Playing

new material is like standing

naked in front of a few thousand

people – it’s uncomfortably

awesome! For us, it’s always

about trying that new thing.”

“No, this isn’t a

move – we’re stuck

like this. Send help!”

QQ&&AA

CROWD

FACE IN THE

claim your loot!

to [email protected] to

a pic of your face and your ticket

Well, you’ve won a T-shirt! Send

at BABYMETAL’s London show?

Is this you getting carried away

forward to releasing it!”

music. We’re really looking

mixture of different types of

of kawaii metal – it involves a

is going to be a new evolution

Thai rapper [F. Hero]. The album

is done in collaboration with a

version on our next album, it

see us again. On the recorded

to learn it before you come to

a lot more, so please make sure

looking forward to performing it

overall a very fun song. I’m

our flags around – it’s just

get to shout, dance, and wave

where both us and the audience

material. PA PA YA!! is a song

“It’s always fun to play new

new stuff to play?

few days. How did it feel to have

which has only been out for a

tonight, including PA PA YA!!,

You played a lot of new material

at the festival.”

been invited to go and play

was. I am so honoured to have

at how magical the experience

festival, and I was just amazed

how many people were at the

we were there, I could see

perform there one day. When

past how cool it would be to

and I were discussing in the

very special festival. Su-Metal

to Glastonbury and that it’s a

“I heard that a lot of people go

down on Worthy Farm?

days ago – how did you find it

You played at Glastonbury two

feels great to be back here.”

of our favourite places, so it

“London is very special and one

back in London?

How does it feel to be

(VOCALS)

MOAMETAL

Not so for Amaranthe, however. Occupying
a similarly ‘more-is-more’ world to the
headliners, the Swedish/Danish metallers
boast three singers and absolutely no sense of
restraint. Songs like Digital World and GG6 are
an absolute tour de fromage, like mainlining
a decade’s worth of Eurovision and adding
constant high-kicks from Elize Ryd. It could
be rubbish, but not when it’s this energetic,
fabulous and fun.
With BABYMETAL, you don’t get such a
human connection, but you do get completely
engulfed by their mad world from the word
go. The inclusion of a nameless new dancer fills
out the routines better than when Su-Metal
and Moametal were touring as a duo last year,
following the departure of Yuimetal, but really,
this detail is a pebble on the cosmic, neon-
streaked beach of the hyper-real planet you’re
taken to from the moment they arrive.
The opening salvo of Megitsune is absolute
craziness, a sci-fi funfair backed by futuristic
metal played by a band of masked figures
who look like the results of a gene-splicing
experiment between Predator and Slipknot’s

Mick Thomson. Flames flare during an immense

KARATE, alternating with the blasts of CO2 to

create Alan Partridge’s ‘Puff-flash-puff-flash’

special effects idea taken to its cartoonish

extreme, while Gimme Chocolate!! is a

disorientating rush of hyperactive brilliance.

Amongst all the spectacle, though, there are

musical treats to be had as well. Not least in

the fact that three new songs are aired – singles

Elevator Girl and manic sing-along PA PA YA!!,

plus an unreleased track with the working title

Ind-metal – and Starlight and Syncopation are

played outside Japan for the first time. But

even during unfamiliar moments, the response

is never less than rapturous.

As BABYMETAL gear up for their next chapter

• advertised on an enormous, space-themed
  projection as the band exit – it’s heartening to
  see such mania. Not just because a decade in
  they still command such frenzy, undulled by time,
  but also that they continue to look to the future.
  Only the Fox God knows exactly what that
  entails, but it’s guaranteed to be big, ridiculous,
  and unlike anything else on Earth. NICK RUSKELL