EPICA, THREAT SIGNAL and BLACKGUARD @ The Palladium – Worceseter MA

The “Design Your Universe” tour came to the Worcester Palladium on the freezing night of January 30th, 2010. Dutch symphonic metal heavyweights Epica brought their formidable musical talents to the fore along with some great supporting acts for this sold-out show.

The first band to hit the stage was Blackguard. The Palladium is a favorite venue of theirs, and they reflected this by charging up the crowd as if they were playing to a massive arena rather than a club. The Canadian metalheads even gifted the fans with a new song, “Farewell,” which will likely appear on a new album due for release late in 2010. Blackguard’s set was rather short (due to the show’s delayed start time), but they still played their hearts out.

Threat Signal was up next; another group hailing from Canada, these melodic thrashers played tracks from their newest album, “Vigilance,” as well as few from their first full-length, “Under Reprisal.” The band mixes extreme metal styles together to achieve their sound, and the fans reacted quite positively. Pieces of thrash, melodic death metal, and hardcore could all be heard, so no matter what your weapon of choice may be in the extreme metal world, Threat Signal played it.

And then…there was Epica. This is a band that has established itself as a major player in the symphonic metal scene relatively quickly, and while the Palladium’s upstairs venue may be small, they filled it with a rich sound indeed. The entire band is composed of extremely gifted musicians, but for most fans, all eyes (and ears!) were on Simone Simons, Epica’s lead singer. Simone’s voice is absolutely breathtaking, and her live performance nearly puts her recorded works to shame. Most of Epica’s songs for the evening came from last

fall’s “Design Your Universe,” including the title track and the single “Unleashed”; but they did round out their set with older songs, too, like the powerful “The Obsessive Devotion.” The highlight of Epica’s performance was their rendition of “The Imperial March” from Star Wars. The band are big fans of film scores, and while this song had appeared on their live album “The Classical Conspiracy,” this version also added bits of other Star Wars music, from “Battle of the Heroes” to melodies from “A New Hope.” The crowd was ecstatic; the hundreds gathered within the Palladium were fist-pumping, chanting, and throwing up the horns as one.

The “Design Your Universe” tour has been selling out regularly, and with good reason; Epica puts on a powerful performance, and they show no signs of ever slowing down.

Check out the Interviews we did with Threat Signal and Epica.

PHOTO GALLERY: By: Diana Guay

For more information on :

EPICA :
www.epica.nl :

THREAT SIGNAL :
www.threatsignal.com :

BLACKGUARD