Written by:	D.T. Metal
Published:	December 20, 2012
Event:	Barge To Hell 2012 (Website)
Location:	Cruise Ship, Miami, FL, USA
Galleries:	Barge To Hell Cruise - Gallery Part Four - 6th December 2012 by D.T. Metal (97) Barge To Hell Cruise - Gallery Part Three - 5th December 2012 by D.T. Metal (82) Barge To Hell Cruise - Gallery Part Two - 4th December 2012 by D.T. Metal (203) Barge To Hell Cruise - Gallery Part One - 3rd December 2012 by D.T. Metal (109)

For those who missed the prior reports:

Barge To Hell Cruise 2012 - Day One: We Set Sail
Barge To Hell Cruise 2012 - Day Two: At Sea All Day Moshing Away

I kind of got stuck at Karaoke the night prior and didn't make it into bed like planned, so we were late getting off the boat on Wednesday morning.

Yes, the cruise destination was Nassau in the sunny [and warm] Bahamas. Ultimate Music Cruise Inc., who also organizes the [url= http://www.70000tons.com/]70000 Tons Of Metal Cruise[/url] makes sure their customers get to see something of the world, which is a nice treat after watching and head banging to the bands on the ship. As matter of fact, their next cruise will set sail the end of January 2013, so head on over to their website, check it out, if you don't have the funds play your local lottery, win, and book a darn cabin.




After actually eating breakfast, we made our way into Nassau, and yep, your typical tourist trap. The cruise liner did have tons of excursions to choose from [for a price], but we decided to just walk over to the public beach, sit in the sand and chill. And chilling we did! Even though the "Rockstars" were lingering around on the beach as well, I didn't want to come off as a Paparazzi - sorry ladies, there are no pictures with band members in their banana hammocks. HaHaHa Nah, just kidding about the hammocks - or am I?

The "concert-day" started early that day, since Nachtmystium was added to play in the Spectrum Lounge. Apparently one of their members didn't make it to Miami on time and he flew out to Nassau to join the rest of the band. Now I really dig Nachtmystium, but as it turned out, even with the missing member back, the band still didn't have ALL of their musicians on board and they played as a 3-piece. Major bummer and since some of their songs DO require that second guitar, they only played a 25 minute set in their 40 minute timeslot. A lot of passengers didn't even know about that Nachtmystium was added and therefore not that many people showed up.

Since the schedule for the bands changed for that day, Monstrosity was the first artist to play on the Pool Deck stage. They were supposed to play on Monday night, but because of the delay and Krisiun not finishing until well after 5am [Tuesday], their set was added on Wednesday afternoon. No disrespect to their fans, and they might have been great when "Corpsegrinder" was still with them, but - well, let me just say that they are not one of my Top Ten death metal bands. Moving on.

I went back to the Spectrum Lounge to meet up with Dan. He missed Morgoth the prior day at the Pool Deck and drummer Marc Reign threatened him with bodily harm if he would miss their set again. LOL

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Notes from Dan:
I met Marc when he was drumming for Destruction. After he left, all I knew was that he joined some death metal band; I didn't know that this band was Morgoth. So I was real surprised to see him on the Barge. Now, I am not at all a fan of so-called "death metal". Outside of albums such as Seven Churches, Pleasure To Kill, Scream Bloody Gore, and a few others from those years, I find the genre tedious at best. So I checked out Morgoth not for the band's sake, but for Marc's. Honestly, they weren't bad. I was glad to hear actual riffs, and not pure mediocrity like, - hmm Morbid Angel? And when compared to Monstrosity who played right before them, it was like night and day. Morgoth seem to be playing death metal right, or at least a lot better than most, and are definitely worth checking out for those who like the old-school sound.

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Never been a big fan of Napalm Death but figured I would check out their performance on the Pool Deck stage. I am here to report - STILL not a fan of them. Don't get me wrong, I love Barney to death and he is the nicest guy ever and Mr. Shane Embury is just a beast on his bass guitar - still can't get into their stuff, sorry! We didn't stick around that long and headed to the dining room, only to be seated with Phil Rind from Sacred Reich.

A small explanation on the dining arrangements on the ship. I assume on a regular cruise one has an assigned table with the same waiter and the same people joining them for dinner, each and every night. Well - not on a metal cruise; you got seated wherever there was space. Meaning one day you could sit with random metal dudes from Sweden and the next day you shared your meal with Mayhem; totally fucking surreal. Oh, and the dress code went out of the window as well. No shoes, no shirt, no service still applied, but that was about it. Dressing up on the Barge To Hell meant, instead of wearing your sweaty black band shirt, you put on a clean black band shirt.

Anyway, long story short, after already hanging out with Phil and his lovely wife in the Bahamas, we had dinner with him. And since we have tons of mutual friends we had a great time just yacking away, and I hereby blame him for missing quite a few bands that night. Nah, just kidding; we took it easy that day and actually ordered desert after dinner as well. [note to self: make a picture of the daily menu at the dining room - food to die for]

The next band we actually went to see that night was Bonded By Blood in the Spectrum Lounge. Holy crap, now this is a band I know and have seen with a few different line-ups over the years. Short story here: right before the band was signed to Earache Records they played a show in Denver at a fricking bar. The "local" opener that night was that amazing sounding and back then somewhat Metallica rip-off, Denver band Havok. I swear, neither of the two bands had members who were allowed to "legally" drink back then. And now - fast forward to 2012, and both Bonded By Blood and Havok are performing artists on the inaugural Barge To Hell cruise. This shows, kids - even if you now play in a local garage band, your dreams just might come true, NEVER lose hope!

As usual, Bonded By Blood got the audience going and even though, once again they had to play in a time slot which was not all that preferable for them, everybody had a great time. While there was chair moshing during Municipal Waste's set the day prior, shit got even more funnier when the fans decided to do a "wall-of-death" with the chairs - priceless!

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Notes from Dan:
Because I missed Bonded By Blood on Monday [thanks to the major delay on the Pool Deck], I made sure to check them out on Wednesday. They were the third retro-thrash outfit I saw on the Barge, and like the others, I'd never seen them before. Given my positive experience with Havok and Municipal Waste, I was actually looking forward to finally seeing them.

Well, Bonded By Blood didn't impress me. Not that they blew, it's just that they play typical Bay Area-style thrash, which to me is a big MEH. [Side note, this means also that they sound little like their namesake, for Exodus's debut is truly atypical for the Bay Area, in that it is actually killer]. So - the musicianship was good, and the guitarist really knew how to play his instrument, but the monster riffage was sorely lacking. But the crowd wasn't as picky as me, and frontman Mauro Gonzales was definitely no slouch. They ended with "Killing In The Name" by Rage Against The Machine, and some of the audience got to sing along (or rather shout) in the mic.

Next up was Artillery. Now I haven't really been keeping up with the Danes, so I didn't know that they had a new singer until I saw that the guy holding the mic had really long hair. He wasn't bad, and neither was the band. But I could kick myself for missing them on Tuesday. My favorite album of theirs is By Inheritance, and while they played three songs from it on Tuesday, they played none when I saw them. Oh well.

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While Dan stayed in the Spectrum Lounge to watch Artillery, I made my way back to the Pool Deck stage to catch Moonspell, who I had missed the day prior. Well, not actually missed, but I chose to watch Municipal Waste instead - priorities I guess. Anyhoo, the symphonic metal dudes out of Portugal stayed true to their sound and delivered an amazing performance. Gee, other than for Behemoth I didn't think the female ratio up front would get any bigger - well the chicks just went nuts for Moonspell as well.

With just enough time to grab a quick drink [to hydrate of course] I headed back into the Spectrum Lounge to once again watch Sacred Reich. It was still a bit before their set and I thought they had the radio on when I heard "Breaking The Law" coming from inside the lounge. Nope, it was Phil and the gang doing their sound check - kick ass!

Not enough can be said about Sacred Reich; they still are one of my favorite old-school speed/thrash bands. After their set, Phil told the crowd to join them on the Pool Deck to watch Municipal Waste; and everybody complied.

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Notes from Dan:
After Artillery, having nothing better to do, I stayed put in the Spectrum for the next band to play there, Sacred Reich. It's a good thing too, for their sound check was extremely entertaining. After diddling around with some Judas Priest riffs, they played three songs [well, the first verse and chorus]: Mötley Crüe's "Looks That Kill", Van Halen's "Ain't Talkin' 'Bout Love", and Judas Priest's "Breaking The Law". Good stuff, especially the way Phil Rind sang them.

What stood out during their set was the "democracy in action" song selection; probably four or five times Phil asked the crowd which of two songs they wanted to hear, and the one that got the loudest response was played. With things like this, and Phil's constant smiling on stage, it showed to me that they LOVE what they're doing. A LOT of people, young as well as old, were standing, fist-pumping and singing along with the songs. And not just fans, there were many members of the other bands enjoying Sacred Reich's set just as much.

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While the Waste was great the other day in the Spectrum Lounge, they were just awesome on the much bigger Pool Deck stage. Singer Tony Foresta used the entire stage to jump and run around and the energy on as well as off stage was electrifying. They ended their set somewhere around 3am Thursday morning and I was actually going to check out Kampfar again, but their set was scheduled at 4am in the morning and - I once again got stuck at the Karaoke lounge and missed it. I heard Kampfar put on an awesome show on the Pool Deck and I could kick myself in the ass for missing it.

Thursday morning, bright and early at 10am Sólstafir was getting ready to play on the big Pool Deck stage while I was still slurping my first cup of coffee. I had seen them at the Spectrum Lounge the other day and really liked what I heard so I stuck around to see them once again.

Still hanging on to my, by then probably fifth cup of coffee, Novembers Doom was setting up on the Pool Deck stage. I hadn't even heard of this band before and was told that they are very popular with the "goth-chicks". Hmmm, anyway - I managed to put some solid food into my stomach and got ready for the German thrashers Holy Moses, who also had their chance that day to play on the big Pool Deck stage.

Despite multiple line-up changes in their 30-years of existence, Sabina Classen pulled it all back together with some fresh blood and showed tons of people who had never seen them live before, WHY Holy Moses stood the test of time. Pure fucking thrash metal at its finest!

Sabina actually had a vocal clinic scheduled later in the day and she told me that she did put out 10 or so chairs for people to sit down. Well, I actually walked by when she had the clinic and holy crap, the Boleros Lounge was rather full and all eyes were on Sabina. Way to go, girl!

Dan went to watch HeadCrusher in the Spectrum Lounge, while I stuck around the pool area for the Belly Flop Contest. The "seize" of the contestants was not that humongous as in prior years, but it was fun to watch nevertheless.

There you go; day three and half of day four are done and documented. The last report and "after-action" thoughts will be posted next.

Make sure you also check out the rest of the band pictures in the Barge To Hell Cruise - Gallery Part Three