Two years ago, they promised to be back. And here they are. Will it be bigger and better? CAN it? Musings and misgivings.

Nokia, always connecting metalheads, is back with another gigantic show featuring Lamb Of god! Even after all these years and all these new bands sprouting up, they still remain one of the largest selling bands in the world. Mark Morton mirroring our excitement, exclaimed that “Never in my wildest of rock and roll fantasies did I ever imagine that our music would take us all the way to India!”. But we did Mark, we did.

Last time, there were four opening acts – Bhoomi, Boomerang, Scribe and Extinct Reflections. There were a couple of complaints about them not being suited for the job. Personally, I think FOUR opening acts is a bit much. If they’d have just stuck with two excellent bands they would’ve probably been better off. 

Anyway, the setlist last time consisted of SIXTEEN mindblowing songs. The mosh pits were crazy and an actual Wall of Death materialised. Audio quality was impeccable – I walked out half deaf with my ears ringing after – And the laser and light effects were crazy too. It was definitely a success, considering this was the first time that Overture India was organising an event on this scale. The concert ended by 9 p.m., among many protests, but then again, no one ever wants to go home from a Lamb of God concert.

This year, we’re looking at one opening band – Skyharbor. The Delhi based progressive metal band with legendary guitarist Keshav Dhar, has just released an album called “Blinding White Noise: Illusion and Chaos” which has appearances by ex-megadeth guitarist Marty Friedman and ex TesseracT vocalist Dan Tompkins, so hopefully we can expect some really brilliant pre-LoG pep. If audio and light are as good as last time there should be no complaint, but we wouldn’t mind if it was better.

All in all, Lamb of God and Overture India will need to really push it to top themselves this time. Or will it be a case of you can never beat the original?

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Catch Lamb of God at the Nokia Alive fest 2012 at Clark’s Exotica, Bangalore, on May 26th.