By Jase Walker
It’s quite handy how a scheduling conflict can be easily addressed by travelling to the other end of the country, in this case it’s Unprocessed’s show in Nijmegen tonight as yesterday I was at another show while they hit Tilburg. Not going to sniff at that because I’ve still got the chance to catch this phenomenal tour with Of Virtue and Daedric in support and arguably an easier trip home afterwards, how handy.
Now it’s no secret that I’m a huge fan of Unprocessed and God knows I’d move heaven and earth to not miss a chance but I won’t lie that I’m super buzzed to see Daedric finally.
Kicking things off with a bit of a janky start on the sound, ‘Night Mother’ bits first and I’m instantly reminded why I got so into Daedric to start with. Thankfully the sound is adjusted pretty quickly and things are getting moving, the initially wary crowd moves in a bit closer soon after and seems to be warming to them already.
Daedric sits within the realm of synth heavy metalcore, with their singer jumping between harsh and clean vocals. I do wish more bands like this had live bass players though, the added oomph to the overall sound always seems to be missing when replaced with backing tracks. Despite that though this show genuinely sounds pretty great on the whole, and seemingly quite a fair bit louder than most opening acts.
As far as what I was hoping for from this show this genuinely leaps over my expectations as I’m a bit used to opener bands often getting a bit of a raw deal on sound so I’m pretty buzzed about this. Initially quite a static crowd are clearly getting won over considering every song they play gets more and more people jumping about and bouncing their heads around to the beat so Daedric are doing a pretty great job on all opener metrics for me!
Despite some of the well, less than enthusiastic responses to their singer checking in on the crowd and whipping up some cheers for Of Virtue and Unprocessed, Daedric still smashed their set and I’m more than made up about seeing them finally. Monday’s can be a bit rough for any band at the best of times but that’s just how it is, top marks for Daedric.
I did some checking and it’s actually been a hot minute since I saw Of Virtue last, so let’s get stuck into another session of big fat riffs! Clearly the crowd has woke up a bit considering the movement that kicked off the second they started playing!
This is one of those bands that so far I’ve only ever seen on smaller stages in support slots and continues to baffle me that they aren’t storming away in their own right. A stage performance that absolutely oozes style and confidence fitting of far bigger shows than tonight.
Of Virtue kicked their show off, immediately firing on all cylinders and showing zero signs of easing off for their show, it may be a support slot but right now it’s their time and they’re going to give it everything they can. Even with splitting the room to kick off a wall of death, they’ve got people whipped up enough to gladly go all out with it.
The band has barely even had to try with getting people moving, the pit’s running itself pretty organically as people bounce around to each song. I mean they’re even lining up their own walls of death pretty frequently and the singer just seems to have let them crack on with it while he does his thing.
It just left me pretty engrossed in the set and doing a bit of people watching while the band absolutely kills it on stage, can’t really wish for much more than that. It’s been fantastic seeing Of Virtue again but I do hope they’ll finally see the growth they so richly deserve in the near future. Everything about their live performance screams music for arenas and I hope that I get to see them dominate a stage like that with my own eyes. A real class act.
Unprocessed finally get themselves started and seeing them go all in with a big intro and light show is giving me goosebumps right from the start. Starting off their set with ‘111’, their ‘Angel’ opening track, the dazzling light show both has me in awe and squinting a bit because good god is it bright.
What a way to get things started though, the lights either side of the drums have strobes in a Chevron shape with several pillars of flood lighting around them. Geometric shapes pepper my vision while Unprocessed hammer out their immaculate grooves and virtuoso melodies, just what I asked for from an Unprocessed show. I’m also unsure whether it’s intentional but the ceiling lights putting out massive white beams weirdly remind me of a biblically accurate angel which considering the album name seems quite apt.
Also, following up ‘Beyond Heaven’s Gate’ with ‘Hell’ seems like a mix of artistic intent with a bit of an in-joke but the moment the riff kicks in for ‘Hell’ the somewhat quiet crowd finally explodes into life.
Each song from Unprocessed always has such dreamy melodies that are either tapped or thumped away and it’s hypnotic watching the band play it, the guitarists bouncing off each other without skipping a beat and even the bass player going to town matching them. It’s some really astounding stuff that manages to be insanely technical from every member of the band and yet somehow remains totally accessible. From the chin-stroking prog types that will stand around trying to figure out where the 1 is to the type of people who just love a fucking good chorus and emotional lyrics, Unprocessed have it down to an art form.
The moment ‘Glass’ starts I feel a surge of joy flash through my neck, I cannot overstate just how much I love this song: more hypnotic playing that takes harmonics on a guitar to dizzying heights that I genuinely never see anyone else doing with the exception of maybe Polyphia.
Admittedly I’m probably less than enthusiastic about their cover of Metallica’s ‘Creeping Death’ mainly because I don’t really think much of Metallica these days and it’s stealing a slot of Unprocessed’s pretty smashing back catalogue. Seeing their bass player switch to a cello for a segment is also a real nice touch and supports my view that seeing a band hit their stride for a headliner show is a real joyous thing to see when they truly make it their own. Finally, to see tonight’s show out, a sort of encore begins with ‘Deadrose’ to the claps and cheers of the crowd.
I feel like kicking myself for missing their last headliner but intend for this to be the first of many for me going forward. Unprocessed’s development and curating of their artistic vision has been staggering over the past few years and I hope to be able to watch them make this journey for many years to come.
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