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By Kevin Meehan
Published: January 30, 2010
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 Thursday, January 28th 2010 was not a good night to live in one of the many homes near Mr. Small’s if you are not a fan of crushingly loud multicultural death metal concerts. If you gazed out your window and read names like Behemoth, Septic Flesh, Lightning Swords of Death and Hero Destroyed on the marquee and began to worry about the safety of your home and neighborhood then this night was probably a good one to stay at a friend or relatives place or maybe hole up in a motel. On the other hand, if such a concert is your cup of (scalding hot, flesh searing) tea then you would not only be proud to host this death metal marathon in your neighborhood, you would probably the first in line to enter the former church across the way and have your face thoroughly rocked.
Lightning Swords of Death hail (Satan?) from Los Angeles and are the type of guys that might make you reconsider visiting there out of fear of a random run-in. With their long locks of hair, shiny buckles and use raspy voiced questions between songs such as “are you the devils children?” it quickly became clear that there wouldn’t be much melodic harmonizing in this set either. But again, the names on the marquee would have led most to assume that to be the case. What the fans did hear were several songs from their 2010 release 'The Extra Dimensional Wound,' such as the song by the same name and “Damnation Pentastrike.” The main problem with these songs was not that they were hard to understand, as anyone with a trained ear for metal could probably make out at least 47% of the lyrics, but that it was so difficult to determine if these guys were serious. I mean, was this set an accurate representation of their daily lives? Does lead singer Autarch order cheeseburgers in his scary demonic voice? One has to wonder about these sorts of things…at least until a better band takes the stage.
That better band was Septic Flesh, a band from Athens, Greece that has been together since 1991 and has released ten, soon to be eleven, albums. It’s hard to say what was more impressive, the flawless play of two guitars, a bass and a drum set along with creepy processed background sounds like choirs and string sections or the fact that they were wearing gloves while doing son. Sure, they were those fingerless, bike riding type gloves but still, that has to be a challenge. Especially for a metal band playing a song like “Virtues of the Beast” from 2003’s 'Sumerian Daemons.' Perhaps it was because they’ve been together for so long that they sounded so much better and more polished or maybe it was the foreign sound that made them so enthralling. Either way, they nearly stole the show. It was a close call until Behemoth began.
 This was something that took longer than expected. As the crowd’s anticipation grew stronger and the wait for the band to start grew longer, people started getting impatient. A fact made evident by intermittent growling with a hint of frustration. Anticipation had also grown so thick that the center of the crowd had cleared out in advance for the mosh pits to come. As the lights dimmed and the opening chords of “Ov Fire and the Void” rang out, the empty pit filled in with a collision of humanity and Bible pages flying through the air. Following that, the sonic assault continued with songs like “As Above So Below” and the very impressive “Christians to the Lions.” After having listened to three previous bands Behemoth’s set was almost too much to take. It was an aural, mental and physical test of endurance. The only real break was during a minute or two long drum solo that was only a break because there was only one instrument being played. It was probably a good thing that the band closed their encore with the long, slow slog of the song “Lucifer.” I would not be surprised if that was all that the band had the energy left to play. They, like the unfortunate, non-metal-listening residents of Millvale, probably wanted to get some sleep.
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