Written by:	D.T. Metal
Published:	April 13, 2012
Event:	Metal Alliance Tour 2012 - North America
Location:	Summit Music Hall, Denver, CO, USA
Galleries:	Metal Alliance Tour 2012 - Denver, CO by D.T. Metal (97)

The Metal Alliance Tour 2012 featuring Wretched, Impending Doom, 3 Inches Of Blood, Job For A Cowboy, Dying Fetus, The Faceless and headliner DevilDriver made a tour stop in Denver, CO at the Summit Music Hall this past Monday.


Since there were way too many bands on this bill to do a comprehensive write-up; Job For A Cowboy was the lucky winner of the straw-pulling contest to see which band I should spotlight. (No animals were harmed in this procedure.)

So, anyways; I hadn't had the pleasure of seeing Job For A Cowboy with the new line-up and their latest album Demonocracy was a day shy of being released here in North America. The guys were the 4th out of 7 bands to perform that night and by the time they hit the stage, the audience was already well warmed up and maybe even showing a slight sign of fatigue in the moshing department. But as soon as the intro "Entombment of a Machine" came on all bets were off.

The band started playing the first song "Embedded" and the fans appeared revitalized and a sea of crowd surfers made their ways over the barriers.

Gee, I still remember the first time I saw them; co-headlining with Behemoth in 2007 I believe, and let me tell you: the dudes came a long way since then.

Well, Bobby Thompson on guitar and Brent Riggs on bass both left the band. But have no fear: the new guys who took over those positions are one hell of an addition to the band. Tony Sannicandro is giving Al Glassman a run for his money as the new second guitarist and Nick Schendzielos, who also swings the bass axe in Cephalic Carnage, is just flat out phenomenal.

Job For A Cowboy went through a lot of shit this past year and maybe with the new members the band finally felt rejuvenated because their set was sick as hell. Even the older songs, like "Regurgitated Disinformation" sounded somehow fresh and updated. Like I mentioned before, Tony is one bad ass guitarist, but Nick on bass took the cake for me that night. He is all over the place on stage; great showmanship and even better playing. Well shit; bassists who pluck instead of pick have a special place in my heart anyways!

Jon Rice on drums did what Jon Rice does best; no need to elaborate. And Mr. Jonny Davy was as usual the master of the microphone with his vocals pretty even in the mix. Love 'em or hate 'em; but Job For A Cowboy played an awesome show and along with 3 Inches Of Blood and Dying Fetus, were easily the top 3 performers of the night.

I wish they would have played more songs from the new album ("Black Discharge" and "Imperium Wolves" were the only ones) but with a 30 minute set I guess their choices were limited. The band will also be part of this year's Summer Slaughter Tour, so let's hope for more new shit then.


Set-list: intro "Entombment of a Machine", "Embedded", "Black Discharge", "Regurgitated Disinformation", "Imperium Wolves", "Unfurling a Darkened Gospel" and "Constitutional Masturbation".

Some afterthoughts:

The good: I actually like the line-up better than last year's, more bands of the same genre on there.

The bad: The venue is a block away from Coors Field and it was the home opener for the Colorado Rockies that day. Parking was outrageous with the lot across the venue going for $50 a space!

The ugly: Touring bassist from DevilDriver got beat up (he's ok) by some idiots while walking to the tour bus (parked 4 blocks away due to the baseball game); another drunken dude tried to steal The Faceless van with their bassist in the trailer. WOW!


More Job For A Cowboy pictures right HERE
And for the rest off the bands check out the Metal Alliance Tour 2012 Gallery