Napalm Death live in Argentina, Groove, Oct 2.

Just a year and a couple of months has passed from the last Napalm Death‘ show in Buenos Aires. They played at Uniclub.

But I remember that shown being completely sold out, and maybe oversold. There was just too much people in there.

Everyone noticed that, and just a single year after, we’ve got Napalm Death touring on Latin America again. So, they’re coming again, now playing at a venue twice bigger than Uniclub. Maybe this time it will be spacious enough for a same ticket demand or more.

The date is oct. 2, and the guest local bands are Eskrota, Miserere and Blodig; totally brutal bands that shake the place with a big portion of tremolo picking riffs, breakdowns, blastbeats and growls. They all felt as very good choices for the opening acts.

Around 21.30 hs, Napalm Death shows onstage. The first song is the Grindcore 88′ classic “From Enslavement to Obliteration”. The band makes a big and agressive entrance, with a very solid sound, and the crazy performance by Barney Greenway, who always seems possessed by the music and spreads the same feeling to the crowd, who can’t stop moshing and headbang hard.

The next songs are “Taste the Poison” and “Next of the List”, 2 brutal tracks from the same album: “Enemy of the Music Business”, and then, the show continues with “Continuing War on Stupidity” (when Barney takes a little time to talk about war).

John and Shane sound so tight that sometimes you can easily think that they’re about to break their strings, and Danny just doesn’t look even a little tired after hitting that drums at the speed of sound.

The intensity keeps on growing as more songs start to appear on the setlist: “Contagion”, “The Wolf I Feed”, “Resentment Always Simmers” (the moment when Barney give us a little speech about how hate can consume yourself slowly; he is such a nice and pacific guy, by the way; don’t let his performance onstage confuse you).

“That Curse of Being in Thrall” and “Amoral” (alongside “Contagion”) are some of the tracks picked from their last LP “Throes of Joy in The Jaws of Defeatism”. And then we come back to the Dorrian era for a bit: “It’s a M.A.N.S. World”.

“Blacklash Just Because”, “Fuck the Factoid” (both from their last LP too), “Suffer the Children” (when people make the biggest circle pit of the night, no joking) and “When All Is Said and Done” are next on the set.

Now it’s time for a caress for the old school Napalm Death fans, so “Scum”, “M.A.D.”, “Success?” from the debut album “Scum” are next. And when you think it’s over, they punch you in the face with “You Suffer”, the famous 2 seconds song.

We’re getting to the end of the night, “Metaphorically Screw You” sounds and then “Dead”, another 3 seconds song (the 2 tracks sounds so hillarious on live).

By now, we all know Barney is a very pacific man against all kind of hatred in the world. He speaks to us saying “no sexism, no homophobia, no transphobia. Always against fascism”, and then the band start playing “Nazi Punks Fuck Off”, the classic anti-fascist track by The Dead Kennedys.

“Instinct of Survival” and “Contemptuous” are the last songs of the show and I’m just blown away.

They give us an amazing show, they deserved to play in a bigger place, and now we all cannot wait to see them live once again. Maybe not next year, but who knows? I just hope they come back sooner than later. I wouldn’t miss their next show.

Photos by Eliana Fernandez

Review by Agustin Lopez

Produced by NoiseGround