Alpha Wolf, Fit For A King, Great American Ghost @ The Gov, Adelaide 11/6/2022
‘Fuck Yeah Adelaide!’ Screams Alpha Wolf vocalist Lochie Keogh from his perch on the stage. ‘This is the best crowd we’ve ever played to in Adelaide’ before the band finish their set with Don’t Ask and the incendiary Akudama amid tidal waves of stage divers and crowd surfers.
It’s been that kinda of a night. The sort of night the walls breathe with every downstroke, every beat, every breakdown which is where Great American Ghost come in.
The Bostonians are anvil heavy, driven from a low end that pushes with force from the stage into your ear holes and vibrates the brain. Vocalist Ethan Harrison is electric and enigmatic leading the way, before jumping into the mosh pit himself. There is lightness within the heavy and the melody’s can be traced throughout their set like Altars Of Snakes which deliciously gets the head banging.
Texans Fit For A King enter the ring swinging as vocalist Ryan Kirby roars ‘are you buried alive’ from the brilliant Shattered Glass. The room sways forward and everyone becomes involved in this metal-tastic interactive show singing back during Vendatta, Backbreaker and God Of Fire.
The music is anchored by the engine room of 1600 horsepower that is drummer Trey Celaya, whose drumming is mesmerising in that way you watch lava lamps. You don’t know how or why but goddamn that guy holds it all together and makes it look easy.
FFAK do drop a brand new song in Eyes Roll Back, which is greeted like an old friend by those down in the pit of flailing arms and legs before, and after eight long years of last being on those shores, they depart like kings.
Alpha Wolf were only here three weeks ago on the Polaris tour. Before that America. In the meantime they’ve dropped a new split single with Wales’s Holding Absence. This is a band that just keeps hustling and the dividends are there to see. A headline tour of many of Australia’s top venues bringing overseas acts is a career changing game defining move that Alpha Wolf has worked to be able to achieve.
They bolt out of the gate with the pneumatic drill riffing of Ultra Violet Violence and subtle dynamics to bring it down, teasing the crowd before exploding like a bomb.
The bands ability to switch gears within songs has become so refined that the bands interaction with the audience is nothing short for foreplay. The Mind Bends To A Will Of It’s Own is faster than most trash metal bands can manage before switching groove to a smoother vibe then switching it up to rhythm that sends the crowd mental.
The first stage divers of the night arrive for Acid Romance and they land on their bouncing-counterparts as Keogh creates arguably the biggest wall of death The Gov has seen for the anthem Sub-Zero.
The crowd sing note for note as the band’s razor sharp guitar and drum work leads us through the belters Isolation and the menacing Restricted before a visibly sweat soaked Keogh screams ‘Fuck yeah Adelaide!’
Alpha Wolf brought a helluva show into town tonight. They brought their mates and they all brought the fire. ‘Fuck yeah Adelaide?’ More like ‘Fuck yeah Alpha Wolf!’
Live Review By Iain McCallum