In terms of a normal year for me, this has been anything but normal for attending concerts so far. This is actually been a good change. I decided for my health mental and physical well-being that I need to do less concert and Festival-going than in the past. Five years ago, I might have been at a show 6 days a week when I lived in Brooklyn. Now I’m down to a few every few months. Even though I do suffer from some fomo, I am picking and choosing my spots of when to make an appearance in the local scene here. We’ll see if it keeps up. Not attending my first show until mid-month February is weird for me, let’s just say that.
Meeting up with my comrade Anita Frausto (go follow her IG), we yet again for a fantastic dynamic duo of reviewing and photos. Anita is really great to work with and I feel fortunate to have her on our team!
Showing up early to DNA Lounge is easy since, it’s around the corner from my house and tonight was an exceptional bill for my first show of the year! The Greek gods of Black Metal SepticFlesh, supergroup Vltimas, Stormruler – who I’m a big fan of, and SIGLOS who I have never seen.
There’s going to be a lot of low light, sage, and smoke tonight for the typical Black Metal concert aesthetics and it was definitely an assortment of diehards in the crowd. San Francisco always represents for the most extreme bands. Some folx were wearing full corpse paint, some with the spikes, but mostly usually just your typical Headbangers corps. I was a little bummed that EX DEO dropped off the tour, but this is what happens in 2025 with all the complications going on between the USA and other countries.
SIGLOS was a great opener. Full stop. They really brought the mystical old-school Behemoth flavor to the proceedings, similar to The Satanist tour. Also bringing an indigenous and Latin-X vibe too. They might have burned enough sage to pull in the fire brigade and the staff had to definitely chill them out a few times on the smoke and fire amounts. Heavy, evil, and engaging; they had everything you want from an opener. Fantastic music and showmanship, and they whipped the crowd into an early frenzy of circle pitting and head banging.
My bros in Stormruler were next and I had not seen them since I lived in Brooklyn, opening for Batushka, so we’re going back about five years now. But they were so good and so sharp on this night that it was hard not to be impressed. They’re one of the most underrated American black metal bands right now, and definitely putting St Louis back on the map for occult, underground music. Great to see my homie Nick Burks on lead guitar, shredding his junk and our faces off as usual. Not just one of the best in the game at guitar, but honestly one of the best people in music I’ve ever met. We connected after the show for a chat. Stormruler is great and apparently they only had a few days to prepare and travel across the country for the tour, which is even more impressive because they seemed tight as fuck tonight.
Next up was Vltimas, a supergroup of Death and black metal Legends. Led by David Vincent, formerly of Morbid Angel, who I just saw a few months back with I Am Morbid, the band was in terrific form. It’s pretty cool to see musicians who have pretty much already made their Apex-level art keep creating challenging and great new music. I will say that David’s evil cowboy thing visually does go perfectly with the music. I wouldn’t mind seeing him co-headline with Spiritworld at some point, just for the vibe alone. But he was in fantastic vocal form and the whole band was exceptional. I didn’t have a very good vantage point to see the drums at any point in this show tonight, but I do feel like Pawel Jaroszewicz in place of Flo Mournier (Cryptopsy) did a fantastic job on the drums. Hard to replace one of the best ever to do it, but Pawel is up to the challenge. Go witness this band if they come your way!
At last, it was time for SepticFlesh. Ghost Cult has been lucky enough to cover this band all over the world in our history, and I have interviewed Spiros Antoniou a few occasions. Fantastic guy, brilliant and humble. The band has a phenomenal flare for the dramatic like all the best bands in the genre, and I was pretty impressed with their extremely tall scrims that accented each corner of the stage. Some bands can just do a lot with very little dressing, and compelling timely lights, if the music is great enough, which honestly should be the goal of every band.
Batently blatantly Satanic and Anti-Christian, but done with intelligence and great storytelling, the band was ferocious musically, and all business on this night. Opening up with the “Vampire of Nazareth” the band tore through their 30-year career of songs with very little chatter, fanfare or fluff. Just a little curation in between songs, but really not too much except thanking the crowd and a little bit of world history along the way. This is what one of the most professional bands in the world looks like in a live setting. We have covered them on the biggest stages in the world and in a small club like tonight, and it feels like a gift to just experience this.
A fantastic start to the concert-going year for me. Look forward to more coming soon!
SepticFlesh setlist:
The Vampire from Nazareth
Neuromancer
Pyramid God
Hierophant
Portrait of a Headless Man
Coming Storm
Martyr
We, the Gods
A Desert Throne
Virtues of the Beast
Communion
The Collector
Anubis
Dark Art
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WORDS BY GHOSTCULTKEEFY
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PHOTOS BY ANITA FRAUSTO
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