I was fortunate enough to spend my Friday night in the midst of fellow metal fans at California deathcore band Spite performance at The Stanhope House, Stanhope, New Jersey, USA as part of the lengthy Kill or be Killed USA Fall tour. Barely escaping the first snow storm in the area the day before, Spite came to New Jersey accompanied by main partners in crime, Canadian death metal band Depths of Hatred from Montreal, and quite a few local bands.
First one I got to hear, was self proclaimed DIY band Drifter from New Brunswick, NJ. Unsigned, handling everything themselves, they seem to have found their niche. Their latest music video for the song “Black mamba” from last EP “The Howling” was also self made, and made possible thanks to their frontman Mike Monto’s videographer skills. Music is heavy, they use unclean vocals with mix of slower more melodic sounds and clean vocals. They themselves have labeled their style as Cinematic Metalcore and while the guys admitted themselves on being rusty, nonetheless they impressed.
Next band to hit the stage hailed from Perth Amboy, NJ. Who I Once Was is new band with their Demo released just recently, and these guys are out to make a mark for themselves. Unmistakably the band is young and in need of more experience while musically they are representing the Metalcore genre. Their performance was steady without many mistakes, and the crowd loved them, some moshing ensued and they did their job of getting their name out to music fans and preparing the crowd for the main course. This band is worth keeping an eye on for further development.
And then it was time for the heavyweights. All the way from Montreal, Quebec on the stage came the band Depths of Hatred. The band has established themselves as a solid death metal / deathcore representative and for this tour the band has Michael Alvarez on vocals (ex-Alterbeast), as their regular vocalist Nico Monette did not travel with them, but is still part of it. Michael was excellent throughout the performance delivering lyrics powerfully and with anger, he got the crowd going. Karl Desjardins stood out perhaps with the most sophisticated and complicated drum set of the night, and delivered masterfully.
Depths of Hatred are touring in support of their EP “Bloodguilt” which was released in July of this year. Most songs on set came from this EP including An Infidel’s Dissent which was released as a single with a music video four months ago. The band brought the crowd to the next level, mosh pit opened up in full force and because the venue at Stanhope, NJ is relatively small everybody got to experience it. Altogether Depths Of Hatred had a flawless performance, giving us full taste of their technical side of the music.
The night’s headliners Spite, unfortunately came in limping having being left without their vocalist Darius Tehrani due to undisclosed illness. Nevertheless the band came out and played most of the show with a replacement vocalist, who by the way was excellent (though his name is still a mystery to me). Jumping around the stage, showing moshers, delivering vocals with the same rage as Darius would. Their soul-crushing deathcore style with slower riffs feels very heavy, especially live. At the end of the show they performed an instrumental part allowing fans to do the singing.
Spite has signed a record deal with Atilla frontman Chris Fronzak’s label Stay Sick Recordings and in 2017 released their LP “Nothing is Beautiful”. They have done extensive touring promoting this album, and earlier this year they were part of Atilla Rage Fest Tour. All that being said, Spite knows how to put on a show, even in not the easiest circumstances, and definitely is considered as a must-see live band.
PHOTO GALLERY
Photos by Andris Jansons
