Bleed From Within are pretty much the top of the food chain when it comes to Scottish metal. Therefore, their pre-tour show at Edinburgh’s Opium, a venue far too small for the band, should be packed to the rafters. Sadly, Edinburgh once again fails to deliver and despite it being a Friday night the crowd is noticeably thinned out at the edges. Thankfully, they don’t seem to let it bother them.
Before we get to that however, Exile the Traitor open proceedings with their technical death metal. It seems to take a song or so for them to find their groove, but when they do there is enough here to get you interested. Their two vocalists trade-off on duties nicely and they have to go in the ‘one to keep an eye on’ pile. Up next are Edinburgh locals Perpetua, whose metalcore sound instantly feels a lot more polished. Sadly, that sound is the same as the hundreds of other bands who are playing metalcore and it never does anything to make you think of ditching the Killswitch albums for them. On the other hand, it’s not bad and if you’re a metalcore fanatic, it should tick all the right boxes.
The final support act is Excellent Cadaver, who feel even more polished than Perpetua and even have some nice banners flanking them on stage. Their metal sound borrows from the likes of Machine Head and Pantera, but with a bit of that modern metalcore vibe thrown in as well and it’s actually really good fun. Lead singer Andrew Downie is obviously out to make an impression and as he throws himself around the venue you can’t help but get into it. They could maybe do with cutting out a bit of the chatter, but that’s nit-picking and with a new EP set to drop soon, Excellent Cadaver look like a band on the brink of doing something.
All of this is of course just a warm up for the main event however and when Bleed From Within hit the stage you can see why they are so ahead of the crowd at the moment. The Golden God winners are on fire and lead singer Scott Kennedy feels like a star. Whether he is berating the crowd for being too quiet or thanking those who helped to fund their Death Walk EP he is constantly likable and has absolutely no problem inciting the crowd to madness.
None of that really matters though without the songs and Bleed From Within are building up quite a collection. Whether it’s older numbers like ‘Colony’, which is still packed full of more groove than you know what to do with, or newer cuts like the ferocious ‘Silence Them All’ ,which had a video drop that very day. The common thread is that they all sound great and the band are tight in their execution of them. They write heavy songs that just make you want to fuck shit up and if they keep doing that nothing is going to stop them.
Even if this gig didn’t have quite the crowd you might have hoped, it can still be looked on as a triumph. Bleed From Within feel far too good to be playing venues this size and if they keep going in the direction they are, those who missed out on Friday night will be kicking themselves in years to come.
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