13th April (Thu)

Keep Of Kalessin

Expensive??

Demonizer

Carpathian Forest

Usurper

13th of April 2006(Thu) : The first night

It was the 6th year of the Inferno Festival,and it seems it was much difficult to get the tickets because Emperor was playing this time. The official hotel of the festival which the festival office had offered to get the cheaper price for the audience was Scandic Eddelkoppen Hotel,but I was staying another hotel called Comfort Hotel Boersparken that was close to the central station. Accommodation in Oslo is really expensive, but I found some hotels had campaign prices during the Easter holiday,so you should check it on the internet if you think to go to the festival next year

Keep Of Kalessin that was the first band at Rockefeller started to play almost same as the timeplan. Not every time the first band can play in front of crows as they start to play around 18:00, but it was what Keep Of Kalessin was capable of. They played at this festival for the first time,besides as the first band,but surprisingly there were a lot of audiences When I come to think of it, I've seen quite many advertisement of them recently, for example on the front cover of magazines etc. Furthermore, I was surprised they used some stage devices like often headliners did, although they played at first. They were playing melodic songs, and some of them were from their latest album"Armada".

A festival is held at least for several hours each day, so of course what an importance is food There was a food stand on the same floor as the Rockefeller, and I went there to check what they'd have and how the price would be. Of course any of them couldn't really be economy prices, as it was in Norway that was one of the most expensive country in the world here. But those hot hot food was essential to fill eager audiences' stomachs up I was interested in "Lakseburger(salmon burger)" but eventually I didn't try it.... I just ordered "Pølse med potetosalat(sausage with potato salad)", so I may try a salmon burger next year if they have it??

Sausage with potato salad=30NOK

After I was looking around in the venue a bit, I went to the John Dee just before Demonizer started to play. They were a black metal band from Belgium, and it was the first time to see their gig for me. Actually I didn't know even their name before, but I really liked their heavy black metal sound. I know just Enthroned as a Belgian black metal band, and I'm not really familiar with the Belgian black metal scene either,but Demonizer was certainly a cool band

Carpathian Forest started to play around 23:00 at the Rockefeller. A vocalist Nattefrost played as his solo-project last year, and then a guitarist Tchort played as Green Carnation as well. Thinking about it, it's quite interesting that 2 musicians who have complete different type of other projects play in a same band,besides it's Carpathian Forest Nattefrost had had a kind of crazy appearance when he had played as his solo-project last year,but he showed a bit normal,but cool and tight performance as a leader of Carpathian Forest this year.

American Usurper played as a last band at the Rockefeller. It's a point to be able to see not only Norwegian and other European bands but also bands from other continents in this festival. I listen less numbers of American metal music comparing with the European ones, but it was a good chance to see Usurper.

Although it was the first night of the festival, I was really tired after the gig But it means I enjoyed watching the shows,coming and going between John Dee and Rockefeller, sometimes talking with friends and even strangers. So needless to say, I went to bed straight away as soon as I got back to the hotel.

14th April (Fri)

Smoking Area


Endstille


Borknagar


Emperor

14th of April 2006(Fri) : The second night

There was information that Susperia which had been originally placed as the third band at the Rockeheler would play as the second due to the Dismember's flight schedule.

I wanted to have some rests before going to the festival, so I went to the venue just before Susperia started to play.
Norway has the smoking ban, so the smoking area was placed at a roof of the venue as usual. It was outside,but mach warmer than last year,as the festival was held in April this year Then,some dark and satanic objects made by Norwegian cybertrash sculptor René M. Hamel aka Spacebrain were displayed there and many audiences took pictures of them.

Cool!

I saw Susperia's show for a while, then surprisingly they played a song of the Norwegian-legendally pop band A-HA Besise it unexpectedly went with Susperia. Nice They covered a Wasp's song as well. A keyboardist Mustis from Dimmu Borgir played a song as a guest performance.

I watched German Black metallers Endstille's gig at the John Dee. I went to their gigs a couple of times before as well, and I've wondered why some members put on a corpse paint,but others weren't.

Borknagar started to play around 23:00 in the Rockefeller. When they appeared, or let's say when a vocalist appeared on the stage, I lost any words to say about his style It was the first time to see Borknagar's gig, and I'd heard he had cut his hair to the short, but a short hair with a border-long sleeve.... I couldn't believe he was the same person who had been singing in Borknagar since before. What was going on??

Finally the time had come to Emperor! Their gig started around 1:00 as a headliner of the second night. Tons of audiences gained to the Rockefeller, and photographers were separated into 3 groups to take pictures, as they were supposed not to be able to enter the photo pit at once.
The audiences who had been so excited since before Emperor appeared on the stage was heated up even more when a vocalist Ihsahn started to scream. Ihshan's MC was Norwegian just for a few first parts, then he changed it to English for the audiences as quite many of them were from other countries. Then he described his band as "We are Emperor from Telemark!!" Telemark is a bit mountain area which is about 2-3 hours away from oslo to the west by car. By the way, I've been living in Telemark since last August and now I'm really proud of it
The band consisted of 3 permanent members(Ihsahn,Samoth,Trym)+ a keyboardist and a bassist(Secthdamon-Myrkskog,Zyklon), then they performed dynamically and majestically. Samoth and Trym had been playing in front of metal audiences as Zyklon,but Ihshan who played that kind of music in public after a long time didn't disappoint us either. A backdrop which was printed as the jacket of their debut MLP "Emperor" was hung on the stage, and the band was mainly playing the songs from In the nightside eclipse and Anthems to the welkin at dusk. The combination with a synthesizer was was dark atmospheric and symphonic. The songs they played covered their past albums from old to new as a whole, so it was a good balance.
When the band appeared responding for the audiences' encore on the stage, Ihsahn wore a black shoulder pad with thick metal spikes that reminded us before they split up. Even


<< Thanks for Baletempest and Lars R giving me the information!!

15th April (Sat)

A flyer to the Emperor's autograph session



Disiplin

Myrkskog

Bolt Thrower

Marduk

Merchandise

Program in Rockefeller

Program in John Dee

15th of April 2006(Fri) : The final

An Emperor's autograph session was held while the excitement from the previous night hadn't to die down in a shop called Bodymap. This shop has a lot of merchandise like clothes and accessories, so check it out if you have any chances to visit to oslo.

After that Emperor moved to the festival's official hotel "Eddel Koppen" to have a live-interview. I tried to record it, but my recorder wasn't really in good sound condition and it even stopped several times while the interview was took place Sorry, I've got just an old-fashioned one with a mini cassette tape Anyway I extracted some parts of the interview,and put some pictures, so click a picture below.

Emperor with an interviewer Gunnar Sauermann
from Metal Hammer Germany

The first band at the last night in the Rockefeller was Disiplin. Actually I didn't really plan to look at their gig as I'd watch it about the end of April in a local venue close to my home. But when I was there while disiplin was playing, suddenly Nattefrost appeared on the stage as their guest vocalist After all I watched their show until the end, then I was quite impressed by their stage costume Anyway, even guest musicians were gorgeous like Nattefrost for Disiplin and Mustis for Susperia in the previous night. This is Norway

Myrkskog appeared as the second band on the stage at the Rockefeller. Although their appearance was announced as a replacement of another band just a few weeks before the festival, they showed powerful and aggressive stage as usual, then the audiences responded enthusiastically as well.By the way, I'm sometime confused about members of Myrkskog and Zyklon. Some members play in both bands and besides they play different musical equipments in eacn. Moreover,it's a matter about their names. "Secthdamon was replaced from Daemon as a vocalist&a bassist in Zyklon,and a drummer in Myrkskog is Secthdemon,then their vocalist is Destructor who's plays in Zyklon as well"....
Anyway I like both bands though.

I saw Bolt Thrower's gig for the first time. They played as a third band at the Rockefeller, and they reminded me about when I was young. I remember their songs were in a compilation CD released by Earache.It's quite difficult to continue a band and to keep the motivation to play for a long time,but they were still great.

Swedish black metallers Marduk started to play around 23:00. Thinking about this band, actually only a guitarist is the original member now. Having several member changs, they are still on top of the black metal scene,so it's a kind of remarkable fact. They've been releasing their albums constantly, even if most members were completely changed. So I suppose Marduk is Marduk as long as they continue to play their songs, even if there're any member changes.

I checked the merchandise corner in spare moments from watching the gigs. There were alot of metal bands' T-shirts and other goods,gothic clothes and accessories. There was even a fitting room like the one in ordinal clothes shops.

Finally, the festival came to the end. The final band this year was Cathedral. Their groovy metal sound was really unique in the festival different from anybody else, even if some songs were from more than 10 years ago. This band also reminded me about my young age same as Bolt Thrower played at that night. In the end, many audiences looked exhausted actually including me, but I guess it explained how everybody enjoyed the festival.

Cathedral

The laminate cards which had the time schedule both in Rockefeller and John Dee were distributed to each audience at the entrance.They had a strap and hangable, so everybody could check which band would be playing next so easily. It was really handy, so I hope the festival continues having this system in the future as well