After a decade of waiting, the Philippines is now on the metal map and these past few years, Pinoy fans had the chance to see acts such as Shadowsfall, Death Angel, and Darkest Hour perform live at the annual Pulp Summer Slam. Shadowsfall also headlined a concert last March 15, 2007 at the A-venue Concert Hall. Before these events, nobody thought it was possible for metal bands to even recognize our country as a decent place to perform in, but we proved them wrong and showed the world that the Pinoy metal scene is still very much alive and bangin’. This coming October, those who refuse to recognize the affluence of ‘that dirty music where kids go crazy and the singer sings out to Satan’ (and other stereotyping I don’t really want to hear anymore) are in for a rude awakening. Not only is there a market for metal, but that market is actually massive with active scenes reaching as far as Iloilo and Davao.
Right now, the name that is coming out of every metal head’s mouth is “Arch Enemy”, a Swedish melodic death metal band that is considered as one of the newer groups to come out of the Gothenburg, Sweden metal scene and incidentally, they will also be coming to Philippine shores this October 20 and perform a one-night-only show at the World Trade Center with our own homegrown bands such as Mortal Fear, Bloodshed, and Intolerant as supporting acts.
I must admit that although the band is no Linkin Park or Incubus when it comes to the masses’ familiarity with what they are all about, nonetheless, any music fan who is into metal absolutely knows who Arch Enemy is and how they hold the international metal industry in their very skilled hands. The unfamiliarity is also due to the fact that mainstream music in the Philippines are much into rock and alternative and less into metal, however, Arch Enemy is in fact big in Europe, US, and Japan – to some people, they practically own Japan since day one. And for those who are not yet that familiar with Arch Enemy, well, all I can say, you still have time to discover the band and hear their music before they do the show in October. Just consider yourself lucky that we gave you a fair warning. In the meantime, while metal heads are awaiting their arrival, Pulp gives you a preview on Arch Enemy’s past albums. – Get Pulp's October (100th) Issue to read more