Presented by Rockfact Music Club & IRON-T21

Rockfact Music Club, Münchenstein,  Switzerland – 04.12.2021

It’s december again and the weather doesn’t always show its nice side, but rain and snow or both together. It belongs to winter like the cocktail to summer. The association IRON-T21 presented their final concert for 2021. Initially I hoped for a better year after the disastrous 2020, but the situation remained the same. For that reason it was time again to focus on hard stuff. There’s nothing better than a metal concert at Rockfact Music Club. Headless Project  was listed in the program as headliner and Dreams in Fragments were added as support act. In these hard times, a charge of hard guitar riffs with sinister vocals is good to disconnect from reality. Or like the famous American blues musician Chuck Berry once said: "Music should make people forget their problems, if only for a moment". The doors of the venue opened at 8 pm.  

After the certificate check, it was allowed to enter with a mask (since 1.12.2021 this rule applies in the canton of Basel- Country). There, metallic sounds from the speakers awaited the visitor, which aroused anticipation for the upcoming live experience. Dreams in Fragments performed as first band of the evening. The melodic dark metal four-piece from the village Wangen at Olten in Solothurn entered the stage at 8:40 pm. An intro introduced the appearance. With "Hey You" the first song rang out and singer Seraina Schöpfer in an elegant outfit presented her classically influenced voice to the audience. Guitarist Chris Geissmann accompanied her with dark black metal vocals in between and thrilled with guitar solos. There was a short interruption after "In Flames" due to technical problems. Seraina used this circumstance to promote the band's merchandise. However, the technicians on site were able to defuse the situation within a very short time and the show continued. What stood out of this group, was the very varied sound with tempo changes and songs that were harder and faster, but also slower and contained many melodies.  "We Shout Again" had the audience singing "Ohhhh" twice as the line "When Echoes Fade" rang out. They did that so well that Seraina praised them. Time passed and the second last song "Own The Night" was played, which is a hit for me. It would be cool if a video clip was shot and released for this, because it convinces with catchiness. Then with "Unireverse" the last song was played and the band members said goodbye to an enthusiastic audience while an outro ended their performance. At their first show in the canton of Basel-Country they made a good impression. Setlist Dreams in Fragments Intro Hey You In Flames By the sea forever Falling with a crown Nightchild To Avalon We shout again Rage and Fire Nightmare The Mind’s Abyss Own The Night Unireverse Outro In the meantime, the Rockfact Music Club had filled up with many spectators and what immediately noticeable was the majority young audience in the age of 20-25. Therefore, I was very curious about how the headliner would present itself this evening. Headless Project took the stage at 10:40 pm. I saw the metal band from Liestal for the last time at the beginning of August 2021 at the farewell concert of Frijgard at the Kulturhotel Guggenheim, where they caused a lot of enthusiasm. The intro was the theme from the movie "2001 - A Space Odyssey" by the late US film director Stanley Kubrick, which I thought was an excellent choice. The band members were wrapped in red spotlight and "Endless Greed" was played. The band set the musical marching direction from the beginning with hard, razor-sharp guitar riffs and singer Florian Huser presented his deep vocals with rock'n'roll undertone. He didn’t only come across as likeable, but also convinced with his voice through variation and interacted with the audience. Lead guitarist Alexander Tschan let the riffs speak for themselves and shone with solos in the spotlight. Frequent stage changes between him, guitarist Juri Nicolai Werst and bassist Andi Hafner added a pinch of additional action to the live spectacle besides the hard, catchy sonic brew, which featured influences from Megadeth, Annihilator and Pantera. They also had guitar duels with each other. The audience reacted enthusiastically and showed this with a lot of applause. Environmental disasters like floods got an ass- kicking with "Flood" and then it was time for the nice song "Warrior". This one was about how the band mascot Jeff found his lost head again, put it back on to keep fighting for metal. That's how it has to be! This was followed by "Escape" and then drummer Luc got some attention. He was allowed to show his skills with a drum solo and solved this task with flying colors. He received a lot of applause for this successful interlude and Florian revealed that Luc has been in the band for six months. With Thomas Gisler and singer Martin Grieder (now with Craticula behind the mirkofon) two former Headless Project band members were on site and they were paid respect with applause. Then the party anthem "Whiskey" followed, which had its effect on the audience and let the mood rise. With the motto "Whiskey, Vodka or Beer - you get drunk" nothing can go wrong, because the party goes on. As a surprise a jam session followed, which was very special, because that doesn't happen often with metal bands in a concert, but singer Florian & his band mates are just different and provide variety. After that it got loud again with the hard "Deadline". So far lead guitarist Alexander Tschan was allowed to shine with his solos, but in this song, guitarist Juri also got the opportunity to present himself with his dexterity. He did it sovereignly and earned a lot of praise. After that the band members were on their way to leave the stage, but the encore calls became more numerous and they came back. "No last man standing" became the encore. The show was over and Headless Project was adopted with a lot of applause. 65 minutes were enough to blow the everyday worries out of the heads of the audience and install good mood through hard sounds. I‘m already looking forward to the next event with the metal heads from Liestal. Setlist Headless Project Intro Endless Greed Case in Point Lies Flood Warrior Escape Whiskey Deadline No last man standing Conclusion: This evening I was very impressed how many young spectators made it to the Rockfact Music Club and joined the concert. In this day and age, this is a great gesture towards bands and promoters and despite the certificate and mask requirement, they enjoyed the ambience. Livereport by Dominic Latscha