Report

2023 Sabertooth PDX

Sabertooth Portland 2023 – Part 1 (of 3)

I had heard of Sabertooth Fest before, but 2023 was my first experience. In prior years, I always had something else planned or couldn’t make the 5-hour drive. The festival has been going since 2015—when it was a three-day festival (all in Portland) and headlined by Sleep. Dubbed a psychedelic music festival—the emphasis was much more on doom and stoner metal this year.

This year’s Sabertooth took place over two days—the first in Tacoma with a much smaller lineup. This was the first time Sabertooth has happened in several years. The festival usually took place in February when it was active between 2015 and May of 2019. Prior acts included Built to Spill, Japanese Breakfast, Parquet Courts, Super Furry Animals, etc. so this year’s Sabertooth definitely moved in a heavier direction.

10 bands were on the Portland bill, with the first band not beginning until 4:20. Yob wrapped things up before 11:30. How do 10 bands play in just seven hours? Two stages, with some overlapping, and fairly-short sets is how.

I arrived at about 4:20 and wandered into Lola’s Room, for the first time, shortly thereafter. Lividus was probably into their second or third song. I wasn’t familiar with them, but they sounded good. The room was hot, and the lighting was minimal and unchanging. Not good, as things were only going to get hotter and more crowded as the evening progressed.

Lola’s Room (just under the Crystal Ballroom—which was good for not having to go far between bands) is designed for a small, sit down audience on a cold winter night. Portland may have hit 90 degrees on this day, but Lola’s Room felt hotter than that. A stand-up crowd meant few could see well as the stage was only about a foot off the ground. The silver linings to the space were the seating on one side and the ample water stations in the back.

Heading upstairs to the Crystal Ballroom was a breath of fresh air—literally. Not crowded and at least 15 degrees cooler, I was excited to see a band that had been in my music rotation for the last few months—Hoaxed.

Hoaxed was excellent live, and I began to notice an unadvertised theme of the festival—women in metal! When’s the last time you went to a metal festival in which 40% of the bands had at least one female on stage and more than 20% of the musicians performing were women? (If the UADA/Ghost Bath/Cloak tour wasn’t on the Sabertooth bill the numbers would have been closer to 60% and 35%!)

Speaking of Cloak, they were one of the main reasons I decided to drive five hours (each way) to attend. As far as I know, this was as close as they’ve ever been to me, and I’ve been a big fan of their music since I first heard their debut album in 2017. Their style hits my sweet spot. If you are not familiar, I suppose you could say that if Satyricon, Slayer, and Tribulation had a baby… If you are already acquainted (and are looking for somewhat similar bands), then I suggest you check out Denmark’s Slægt.

Anyway, I thoroughly enjoyed their set. My two complaints are that they were in Lola’s Room instead of the Crystal Ballroom, and they weren’t given enough time. Personally, I would have switched Will and Cloak. Local band Will (who don’t even have an album out yet) may have more friends in Portland, but the fact that Cloak came so far and has a much greater following overall (not to mention three excellent albums) should have bumped them up on the bill IMO.

Part 2 can be found here.

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Frozen Crown Introduces New Guitarist

Italian power metal outfit Frozen Crown has announced that they have recruited a new guitarist by the name of Alessia Lanzone. Rather than replacing anyone, Lanzone's addition will make the band a six piece. A statement from the band reads as follows:

"Dear friends, yes, you're seeing right: there's a sixth member in our band (and this is not temporary)! Her name is Alessia Lanzone and she's going to share lead and rhythm guitar duties with Sheena and Federico both live and in the studio! Just like Niso when he joined the band, she's just 17 years old, but during the last months spent secretly together she already gave us proof of her huge talent, as well as being an awesome person, and we can't wait to finally introduce her to you live! She'll make her live debut with us at our next show September 16 in Tuttlingen (DE), where we'll bring her on stage with us for the first time for an exclusive and unique event! Don't miss it!

"As you know, we progressively increased the amount of guitar tracks in our albums, and nowadays our songs are a feast of harmonized riffs and leads, counting dozens of guitar layers, at least in the studio. During our stage performances we've been missing for long the huge impact a rhythm guitar player can add during twin leads, and lead guitar wise, Sheena and Federico had to re-arrange many songs, sacrificing many parts for the sake of them sounding right in a live environment and not too empty. YES, some may say: why don't you simply add guitar layers in your backing tracks like most bands do nowadays? The answer is we never included guitars in our backing tracks, and we never will. That just feels so wrong. Yes, this may go in sharp contrast with the latest tendencies of having layers and layers of instruments (and even vocals) included in the backing tracks: many bands do that and it's definitely more practical (as well as it's making things easier, let alone having less people in the line-up means less travel costs). But that's not our cup of tea, we just want to sound as live as possible (and if you ever attended one of our live shows lately you'd already know we just have a few keyboard as sequences, mostly just in some crucial parts, and that we always sounded as raw as possible). We always did what we felt doing, and never followed any trend since day 0. So here we are: Frozen Crown is officially becoming a band with three guitar players!

"So let's welcome Alessia: thanks to her our live songs are going to sound truer to their original sound and our shows are going to turn into an even crazier guitar action feast!"

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Deciduous Premiere New Single & Lyric Video

Phoenix, Arizona-based technical brutal death metal band Deciduous premiere a new single and lyric video by the name of "Swarm of Spores", streaming via YouTube and Spotify for you now below.

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Insect Inside Premiere New Single

Chelyabinsk, Russia-based brutal death metal outfit Insect Inside premiere a new single titled "Parasite Messiah", streaming via YouTube and Spotify for you now below. The track is featuring a guest contribution by Len from Pestilectomy.

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Nauseating Premiere Full-Album Stream Of New EP

Chelyabinsk, Russia-based slamming brutal death metal/beatdown trio Nauseating (Traumatomy, Insect Inside) premiere the full-album stream of the band's brand new EP "Stabbed. Mutilated. Collected", which was released September 3, 2023 via Vile Tapes Records.

Check out now "Stabbed. Mutilated. Collected" streaming in its entirety via YouTube and Spotify for you now below.

Track-list: More...

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