Arrived at the venue semi-late and discovered that the first two opening acts had been replaced by Order Of Chaos. I dunno what the deal with the cancellation was but I was a little miffed at missing OOC. Anyway, I headed inside and caught the last half of Volatile's set.

Very, very strange bunch this Volatile. I had heard reports of their wild live shows (pyros, BBQs, etc) so I kinda knew what to expect. But nothing prepares you for when you see them in the flesh! They have a "drummer" in the form of a mannequin sitting at a drumkit, who's head blows up at several stages during the show! I guess it must all be too hard for him to keep up with the hardcore beats that their drum machine produces.
They put on a fairly energetic show tonight, although I don't think most of the crowd really knew what to make of it all. The music sounded awesome, distorted bass, monster metal riffing, and if you closed your eyes you'd swear it was a real drummer up there with em. Quite a tight little unit considering their percussion situation.
The only thing that turned me off were the lyrics, pretty outrageous, non-PC kinda stuff. Maybe that's just me though. I guess they are a band not to be taken seriously. However far that takes em is anyone's guess. But they are pretty entertaining if you dig that kinda stuff.

Next up were the "dope smoking motherfuckers from Northcote", Blood Duster. I don't think they failed to disappoint anyone tonight. Tony lit up a spliff at the start of the set and proceeded to pass it around the front row which got most of the pit fired up! During the first couple of songs he took it upon himself to get down into the action and threw himself into the crowd, growling out all the tunes. Their set was pretty similar to that at Metal For The Brain last month. But I highly enjoyed that show and this one was no less enjoyable. The smaller venue just made it that more (to quote Bruce MacAvaney) "special". No real highlights, just an all round fun show. Some truly funny moments included Fin and Jason's guitar cords being pulled out mid-song, leaving them red-faced when their instrument suddenly cut out. Some drunken fool jumped on stage at one point and had his mate snap up a photo of him and Tony, to which Tony grinned and said, "what a happy moment!". I guess with the fame comes the groupies! Then Tony started drilling Jason after introducing one song as "a Dern Rutlidge cover!", all in good fun of course.

After the gig finished I met up with Strapping Young Lad & Zimmer's Hole bassist Byron Stroud (who is out here on holiday with his girlfriend at the moment) who had come along to check out the show. Very cool bloke. He is of course a big fan of Blood Duster and said if Zimmer's Hole ever tour here (which they were in fact supposed to do earlier this year) the support act would HAVE to be tha Dusters.
Here's hoping it happens one day for that would be a truly awesome bill!

-Ozz