This April, Trivium return to the UK on a Metal Hammer-sponsored tour that will also be packing support from Grammy-nominated destroyers Code Orange, Texan thrashers Power Trip and the UK’s own death metal machine, Venom Prison. There’s an abundance of reasons you cannot afford to miss this travelling metal Mecca when it rolls near you this Spring – and here are ten of them!
Trivium just dropped their best album in a decade
Landing late last year, The Sin And The Sentence was the Trivium album we’ve been waiting for. Crushingly heavy, catchy as fuck and full of heavy metal thunder, it combines all the best things of Trivium’s evolution over the last 15 years into one, neat, hour-long package. There are so many tracks we’d love to hear played live, but we’re particularly gunning for the title track, Beyond Oblivion and Sever The Hand. Full beast mode, all of them.
They're also on the form of their lives
While Silence In The Snow was a divisive album, the touring cycle that followed it further consolidated Trivium as one of the best live bands in our scene today. The Floridian metal mainstays beefed up their stage show with new props, effects and a metal-as-fuck looking set. Add a dosing of those killer new songs to the mix and you have a show that’ll be blowing roofs off some of the UK’s biggest venues.
...And they're dusting off the rarities
If rumours are to be believed (AKA what Matt and Paolo have been spouting all over the place), Trivium have been rehearsing some old, rare cuts that we reckon may just hit a setlist or two come April. Put short: whether you’re an old school Trivium fan or new to the cause, there’ll be something for you at these shows. And we’re down for all of it.
Code Orange are the most vital band in heavy music right now
It’s not all about Trivium on this tour. Not by a long fucking shot. These dates will also see Code Orange – unquestionably 2017’s breakout band – play their biggest ever shows, and you can guarantee that they will be coming to kill. If you’re yet to see the Grammy-nominated hardcore innovators live, do not sleep on this opportunity to get a ticket and say those immortal words: ‘I was there’. We’re backing their sets on this tour to be something we’ll be talking about for a long time to come.
Power Trip are thrash's best band in a generation
Having ploughed their way through the underground over the past half-decade, Power Trip have been getting called up to tour with everyone from Napalm Death and Cannibal Corpse to Lamb Of God and Hatebreed. That they not only haven’t been dwarfed by such esteemed company, but have been stealing shows all over the place, tells you everything you need to know about how much the Texan natives crush it live. Crank up last year’s explosive Nightmare Logic and get ready for enough riffs to deafen a T-Rex.
Venom Prison are the new face of UK death metal
It’s barely been 18 months since their debut album Animus first tore our ears clean off, and yet Venom Prison have already become one of the most exciting young bands in extreme music. From playing the main stage at Bloodstock to picking up a Best New Band award at last year’s Golden Gods, it’s been a hallmark year for the Welsh death metallers, and they’re only just getting started. Plus, they’ve done it all while turning standard extreme music conventions on their head and being unafraid to fight for real world issues through their music. The fact that we’ll be getting to witness a young, unique death metal band open up a bill at venues like Brixton Fucking Academy is something to be very excited about.
It's one of the most diverse bills of the year
Metal. Hardcore. Death metal. Thrash. All represented on this bill and all done so in a way that is taking each respective sound into exciting new shapes and directions. This isn’t a tour repping for one particular scene or sound. This is a tour that is for people that love fresh, exciting, heavy-as-shit music. It’s as simple as that, and shows that the scene is alive and kicking on every part of the spectrum. Which leads us to our next point...
It's also a window into the most exciting crop of bands in a generation
That we have an on-form and fired up Trivium headlining is reason enough to be excited, but the fact is that between Code Orange, Power Trip and Venom Prison, we have a bill featuring three of the most exciting metal bands of recent years. Metal never goes away, but to have three bands, all in such early stages of their career, smashes it on all levels and on one tour together, warms our blackened, crusty hearts.
You'll never catch all these support band on one tour again
Why? Because, quite frankly, the next time these bands all roll around these shores, they’ll be too damn big. Like we said before: this is going to be a real ‘I was there moment’ for everyone that has picked up a ticket, and we fully back Code Orange, Venom Prison and Power Trip to only go one way from here (hint: it’s up).
What possible better fucking thing will you have to do anyway?!
If you’ve honestly got an excuse to be missing out on seeing Trivium, Code Orange, Power Trip and Venom Prison on one tour, we hope it’s a good one, because if nothing else, we can promise you this: you will not get a better (or heavier) night out this year. Don’t say we didn’t warn you. Ours is a pint and we’ll see you down the front.
Trivium, Code Orange, Power Trip and Venom Prison tour dates
16 Apr: O2 Academy, Bristol – Buy tickets
17 Apr: O2 Academy, Birmingham – Buy tickets
19 Apr: O2 Academy, Glasgow – Buy tickets
20 Apr: Academy, Manchester – Buy tickets
21 Apr: O2 Academy, Brixton, London – Buy tickets
