The fifth edition of Unseen Underground Pub Fest happened at Geoffrey’s pub in Chennai some time back. The event was another extreme metal treat for Chennai metalheads.
The gig was sponsored by Kingfisher, co-sponsored by Levis Strauss *Signature* and Lavazza, supported by HMI guitars, SS Music and Radiomirchi 98.3FM. HMI’s new rage of Metal guitar display in the venue added extra attraction to the ambience of the place. Many aspired musicians tried their hands on the HMI guitars and special mention Shri (Blind Image) replaced his ESP guitar with HMI 4RR32 and Madhav (Escher’s Knot/Theorized) used HMI Prima HP5C bass for the entire show.
The gig featured four extreme metal bands – two from Bangalore and two more from Chennai, with each of them displaying their unique talent in their own sub-genre of metal. As the rain Gods vented out their anger outside, in the city, the bunch of metalheads did the same in their own wild manner inside the pub. It was a good turnout and one hell of a show.
Escher’s Knot opened the gig with their third consecutive appearance in Unseen Underground Pub Fest. They started their cover of Textures’ “Drive”. It was then followed by an Escher’s Knot original composition called “This Page Has Been Intentionally Left Blank”. Abhijit vocals were impressive, ranging right from the screeches of black metal to the guttural growls. “Break The Cypher” and “The Mayan Calendar” were other originals that the band delivered flawlessly. With drummer Manu, it was no surprise that Sepultura’s “Territory” started up a mosh in a crowd that has previously heard, and quite loved this version. Finally they finished their set list with “Up For Nothing.”
The next band on stage was Bangalore based brutal death metal fit Abandoned Agony. Reminescent of Cannibal Corpse, thanks to their evil-sounding guitar riffs, the band did create quite a ‘stir’ (in an extreme sense of the word) at the venue. They started off with the title track off ‘Infected Unborn’. “Genocide”,”Terror Assassination”, “Sadistic Pleasure”, and “Deformed” were a few tracks from their setlist. Vocalist Rajesh, who’d also taken up bass duties, put on quite a show. And of course, there can be no Abandoned Agony show without a “Skull full of maggots” cover. The performance was killer, except for the fact that their second guitarist was missing, and certain parts of songs felt pretty blank minus the solos. But overall, they were “brooootal” and tight.
Local metalheads Blind Image released their first album at Unseen Underground Pub Fest II and returned to promote their recent second full length album ‘More Than Human’ at the fifth edition of the show. They started off with the title song from the album. Blind Image has come a long way and have now moved on to progressive hardcore metal from their experimental style. They’ve now introduced some melodic interludes and were a good mood shift after Abandoned Agony. Their play list included “Deciphered”, a cover of “Black Label”, “Ominous”, “Now you’ve Got Something To Die For” and “Glitch In The System”.Another thumbs-up performance.
The last band on stage was thrash metal band Theorized from Bangalore. This band has a good fan base in Chennai and the audience was quite thrilled to watch them live. They opened with “Dark Incarnation” and went on to “Raise The Dead” and “Thought Experiment”. One would think that after three heavy bands, the crowd would’ve been tired, but Theorized managed to keep the energy levels going. This was evident when a huge mosh almost dismounted a huge standing loudspeaker! But, the band continued without rest and performed their cover of Death’s “Pull the Plug”. Their last two songs were “Blackout” and “Venomous Tormentia”, and Theorized ended the show by making a strong statement that they are one band to watch out for in the future.
Source: Nicky / Vijay / Shruti
