Mayhem – 30 years of “Live in Leipzig”

Every metal fan, not only of its darkest and dirtiest sub-genre, will be familiar and aware of the uniqueness, meaning and importance of the live record capturing Mayhem’s seminal concert in Leipzig in 1990, short after the fall of the wall. This record, which ended up being one of the few posthumous records of Dead’s voice in some of the most essential tracks in Black Metal’s history, became a milestone and reminder of Dead’s genius and irreverence. It also showed the unique chemistry between Euronymous’ haunting riffs, leaving the whole community mourning for the loss of these musicians. The first celebration attempt, which would have taken place exactly 30 years after the initial concert date had to be postponed twice, due to reasons that everyone still can remember (lockdowns, pandemics and so on). However, it finally happened on the 15th of December, amidst a freezing winter storm. before the band embarked on two more gigs across Europe. The jubileeum celebration started with a small introductional speech from Abo Alsleben who reminded us of his role in bringing black metal to Eastern Germany and organised the band’s small tour across the mentioned territory.

The opening act had something unique: a black metal band forged by Syrian refugees living in Leipzig. And what a concert it was! These fellows unleashed a fierce and relentless black metal; with clear influences of Mayhem (as expected), Dissection and Satyricon; and took the room by storm. The band played around 7 songs and left the audience stunned by their performance. Yours truly went directly to the merch booth to try and get any record of theirs but there was none. After some inquiries, it became clear that Nargate has one EP available on Spotify and that they’ll release their first record in 2023. I’ll be certainly on the lookout for this gem of a record!

Next, we had the Leipzig collective known as Manos, who opened for Mayhem back in 1990. It’s quite good to see how, after 30 years, both bands remained active and followed different paths. Mayhem went on to invent a reinvent a whole genre while Manos… Well, Manos remained true to themselves and irreverent on stage. Their concert swinged between a dirty crust-punk to some reggae tunes and passing by “party-metal” which left yours truly somewhat amazed and confused. Technically speaking, things could have been better played but that’s not their purpose. Manos aims at delivering a dirty non-conventional performance filling their stage with an immense party in which several spectators took part on.

Next up were the legendary Mayhem coming back to a city which left, unwittingly, a mark in the band’s history. Four banners were hanging on stage, each with the face of each member of the classic and tragic lineup of the band. The setlist followed strictly the original one, and that can be heard in the live record. The whole band was irreprehensible on stage with Attila leading in his unique and diabolic way. The second part of the concert included more recent material such Malum, from the latest record Demon, while My Death and Symbols of Bloodswords, from Chimera and Wolf Lair’s Abyss respectively, took us through Blasphermer-era records. De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas and Life Eternal concluded the concert with some songs from what is arguably, the most important and tragic record in black metal’s history. A jubileum and celebration to remember!