Wolf – Underworld 2009

artist website

venue

impulse buy

After just a few small festival appearances in the UK this year Wolf finally got to headline their own dates in support of Ravenous, the follow-up to their break-through album The Black Flame, bringing Canadian NWOBHM throw-backs Cauldron along too.

Local thrashers Elimination opened to a smallish crowd and did a superb job of not noticing. Their brand of thrash was perhaps a little formulaic, but it followed the tried and tested formula of classic intelligent thrash, rather than the brainless skateboards-and-beer kind, with excellent playing and plenty of energy, so those that bothered to arrive on time were treated to an excellent set.

NWOBHM masquerade Cauldron, by stark contrast, were a joke. Haircuts that looked like comedy wigs, songs with less substance than a day-old bowl of over-milked cereal and a cocky stadium rock attitude came across thinner than a girl in a perfume advert as they desperately tried to prove they were playing the same kind of music we all nostalgically love from the likes of Diamond Head, Angel Witch and Saxon.

Wolf wasted no time at all proving they had nothing to worry about with regards to getting shown up by their special guests as they set about a blistering set criminally restricted by a venue, and associated promoters, wrongly convinced that more support bands represents value for money. How this can be the case when the support bands’ names aren’t on the ticket everyone paid their money for remains a mystery, but the early curfew imposed by the venue for the purposes of setting up their club night was not translated into an earlier door time to fit sensible length sets for each band into the available timeframe (not that the Underworld has ever been capable of opening the doors on time anyway).

Wolf were afforded just 70 minutes as the headline act, and were done by 22:10, but their set was brilliant and energetic, packing as many songs in as they physically could to at least try to satisfy fans who had been disrespected. Make Friends With Your Nightmares and Children of The Black Flame were unfortunate omissions, but otherwise their set included most of their classic tracks and a selection from the new album, including current radio single Speed On and the rousing Curse You Salem.

Wolf’s crowd was good enough, and their set well-received enough to warrant a return trip, and although Ravenous wasn’t quite up to the standard of The Black Flame or even Evil Star, it was a solid album and their popularity is growing constantly amongst the traditional metal faithful, so a 2010 tour should be both welcome and commercially profitable.

“ set was brilliant and energetic ”

Elimination Setlist: Nightmare Asylum / Wargames / End of Days / ?? / Straight To Hell / Destroyed By Creation

Cauldron Setlist: ?? / Young And Hungry / Conjure The Mass / Chained Up In Chains / Into The Cauldron / Makin’ Noise And Drinkin’ Beer / ?? / ??

Wolf Setlist: Speed On / The Bite / I Will Kill Again / Hail Caesar / Electric Raga / Curse You Salem / Voodoo / Genocide / Evil Star // Venom / In The Shadow of Steel

Written by Andy Lye
More: Gigs, Heavy Metal, Wolf