I don’t remember when I wrote my last concert review, so I assume it must have been a long time ago. What better moment to resume this activity than the last minute show of Norway’s Carpathian Forest which took place in Budapest last Saturday in Instant-Fogas Komplexum ? Many thanks to Planetnoir Industries for organizing this event, it was such an unexpected surprise.
I have always wanted to see Carpathian Forest and Nattefrost live but I never had the opportunity to do it until now so the moment the concert was announced I bought the ticket and started to catch up again with the band’s back catalogue. I am a huge fan of the early Carpathian Forest (the demos and “Through Chasm, Caves and Titan Woods” are absolute masterpieces) so the new “sadistic” direction the band went on after 2000 didn’t appeal too much to me. Even so the band is still a legend and that was a good enough reason to me not to miss this show.
The first band to open the night was Witchthrone from Hungary, a band I knew nothing about prior to the concert. Their performance was boring and uninteresting, the type of “black metal” that I do not like at all, devoid of any passion or feeling, therefore I was glad when their show was over.
The second band on the bill was another Hungarian band, Purulent Rites. The first time I saw them in 2022 I really liked their show and now I was looking forward seeing them again, on a bigger stage and in a different set up. Their music is hard to label, it’s a mixture of death and black metal with a lot of groove and the quartet delivered it with a surgical precision. The band has suffered a small change in their ranks which I was not aware of before the show, but that did not affect the quality of their performance. The songs and the singer’s attitude reached their target as the audience started to warm up and become more alive, preparing for what was next to come. Overall Purulent Rites delivered a solid show which I enjoyed a lot from the shadows of the club.
After the usual change over and the rearranging of the instruments it was time to enter into the Carpathian Forest. I decided to go to the first row and enjoy the show to the fullest, alas unaware of the havoc that was to erupt in the moshpit. But I absolutely loved every moment of it, even though at some points it was hard keeping the balance while fending off the crazy moshers behind me.
“We are Carpathian Forest and we play rock’n’roll”. This is how Nattefrost introduced the band after walking on stage, face covered in corpsepaint. Looking at him from such a close point, I could hardly believe he was the same man portrayed years ago by Peter Beste in his famous Norwegian Black Metal themed photos. But the man would soon prove he still knew how to deliver a great black metal performance and that’s what really matters in the end.
Many things have been said about Nattefrost over the years and many of them haven’t been too kind. While physically he may not be not in his best shape, I totally love his persona as a musician. This guy is the definition of “I don’t give a fuck ’bout what you think” and I appreciate him for that. He sang as best as he could, he constantly interacted with the audience, shook hands and fists, made stupid jokes and stood up to his legendary status. After being around in the scene for so long, I think he can be and act in any he wants, as long as he does it right. And on Saturday he did it more than right, he did what he knows best.
While Carpathian Forest IS Nattefrost, let’s not forget the other band members, with strong roots in the Norwegian black metal underground: Malphas (Urgehal, Endezzma, Koldbrann etc), Audunn or Erik Gamle (Svarttjern). They all did a very good job, even despite some minor issues – just before “Sadomasochistic“, the drummer had to take a break in order to fix one of the pedals. The corpsepaint, the outfits (leather, blood, chains etc) and the violent music filled me with a tremendous amount of energy and aggression which I let out headbanging and screaming till I lost my voice. There was an invisible connection between the musicians up on that stage and the excited crowd in front of them and everyone there felt it and fed from it all along the show.
For more than 1 hour the atmosphere in the cozy Instant was electric, with Carpathian Forest going mostly through songs from their first three albums (“Black Shining Leather“, “Strange Old Brew” and “Morbid Fascination of Death“). The set list prepared for the night consisted of 16 songs, out of which 4 were covers. The band also introduced 2 new tracks, “I Will Follow” and “The Beast in Man: The Origin of Sin“, which I hope will be featured on their long awaited new record. The show ended with an insane “He’s Turning Blue”, band and audience hysterically singing together the addictive chorus.
It was a wild and sweaty night which I enjoyed to the fullest and I am extremely happy that I finally had the chance to see Carpathian Forest, one of the legendary True Norwegian Black Metal bands.
Carpathian Forest Set List Budapest 2023:
Intro: The Vulture Swarms
1.I will Follow
2.The Beast in Man: The Origin of Sin
3.Carpathian Forest
4.A Fix on You (Dead Moon cover)
5.Morbid Fascination of Death
6.Martyr / Sacrificulum
7.Sadomasochistic
8.Knokkelmann
Midtro: Damnation Chant
9.A Forest (The Cure cover)
10.Bloodcleansing
11.Gate of Nanna (Beherit cover)
12.Pierced Genitalia
13.Mask of the Slave
14.Bite It You Scum (GG Allin cover)
15.Black Shinning Leather
16.He’s Turning Blue
James Bond Outro
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