As The Palaces Burn

Lamb of God are one of the biggest bands on the planet that most of the planet hasn’t heard of.  They’ve sold nearly two million albums in their home country, the USA, been nominated for Grammy’s and their last album shot to number 3 in the US Billboard charts and made the top twenty in the UK.  Yet this isn’t a music review, but rather a look at their recent documentary, As the Palaces Burn, which was directed by Don Argott.

Initially this film was an attempt by the band to turn the camera back on their fans, something which it succeeds in doing for the first half hour, focusing on a fan in Columbia and a fan in India, both who have had their lives dramatically affected by Lamb of God and their music.  Then things went pear shaped.  Coming off a flight in the Czech Republic, lead singer Randy Blythe was arrested on manslaughter charges for the death of a young fan at one of their shows, this revelation meant that the film we ended up with became a very different one from that proposed and the last hour is an intimate look into how Randy and the band deal with these events.

It has to be said straight out they deal with them damn well.  Randy Blythe has been a hard man to like at times in his life, something this documentary doesn’t shine away from, but with him now several years sober we see a very different human being in this film.  The court case cements that and shows a man that should garner instant respect from those watching.  He’s a man who realises that while he is at the centre of this whole fiasco, he is far from the most important person, with the family who have lost their son always taking precedence in his mind.  It’s a theme that is reflected in the whole documentary, this is a band that love their fans and as they struggle with having to fight to survive as a band, they never forget the fact that a fan of theirs is dead because of something (the actual details of which are still not truly known) that happened at one of their gigs.

Because of this this is essential viewing for Lamb of God fans.  Which is probably no surprise to people.  But I would argue it is actually even more so for those of you who have no interest in heavy metal or the people that live in that world.  This is the best insight I have seen to show that just because you play angry music and like to bang your head, it doesn’t mean your some intellectually bereft Neanderthal.  Lamb of God come across as genuinely decent, morally upstanding human beings who love their fans and the opportunity that has been granted to them.  Moments like Willie Adler having to wipe tears from his eyes as a young fan tells them how much they have affected him show the real spirit of this genre of music, and that is something a lot of people could use learning.