Photos: Babymetal and dethklok at the fillmore (denver, co)

Dethklok (USA, Norway, Sweden), Babymetal(Tokyo, Japan) and Jason Richardson (Manassas, VA)

Babymetal and Dethklok; two heavy hitters co-headlined the very packed Fillmore in Denver, CO on Saturday night, Jason Richardson had show opening honors.

Jason was performing solo, however he did use backing tracks off of his two albums to play over to complete the sound, and even though it sounded great, I would have really appreciated the rest of the band. I completely get the logistics of touring being as they are and costs being almost impossible to make it work as an up and coming act, and it was great for what he presented. Extremely talented, but I would like to see him come back with a full band and press access.

Dethklok started their set just as you would expect, with a cold open into the Deththeme from the television show “Metalocalypse”, the show that birthed the band. The co-creator of Metalocalypse, voice actor and singer Brendon Small sounded brutal (in a good way) as he and the band bulldozed through their blocks of music, each bookended by funny cartoons like “Concert Etiquette with Facebones”. Some personal highlights of their set included “Duncan Hills Coffee Jingle”, “I Ejaculate Fire”, “Birthday Dethday” and “Thunderhorse” because I’ve never seen someone actually play it successfully.

The third and final band of the night was Babymetal, the Kawaii Metal Band lead by Su-metal and flanked by Momometal and Moametal. The trio work together in a high-energy, choreographed show that is performed in front of incredible session musicians that are costumed and named the “Kami Band”. Between “Monochrome” and “METALI!!”, Kami did receive some love with some spotlight solo time while the members of Babymetal took a well deserved short break. Once back on stage, they launched into their new single “METALI!!” which featured guitar god Tom Morello on the big screen behind them.

Babymetal closed out the night with the anthemic “Road of Resistance”. As a fan that is still learning about the band, I heard of lot of DragonForce in this song, specifically “Operation Ground and Pound”. I was not surprised to learn later that the amazing Herman Li and Sam Totman had a hand in this. The song was a huge finish to what had been a night full of thundering drums, shredding guitars and so much fan love.

Jason Richardson Set List:

1. 1. Tendinitis
   2. Ishimura
   3. Sparrow
   4. Titan
   5. Retrograde
   6. Upside Down
   7. Hos Down 

Dethklok Set List: