Ingested / The Fleece / Bristol
A trip down to old Bristol town, coincided with the visit of Ingested to The Fleece on St Thomas Street on their 2024 “The Tide of Death and Fractured Dreams” promoting their stunning new album. I was looking forward to seeing Ingested again, having seen them about a year ago when they visited Nottingham’s Rock City, supporting Cannibal Corpse, where they delivered an incredible and powerful set.
Originally a four band line up, but unfortunately Vulvodynia have experienced visa issues and were unable to join up in time for tonight’s first night.
So first up on stage are Australian band Melancolia. A solid performance with some great guitar work and the drumming was brilliant, with Mason blasting out some furious beats pulling it all together, especially in God Tongue which was brutal.
Next up were American technical death metallers Fallujah, from San Francisco. Formed back in 2007 they have toured extensively with the likes of The Black Dahlia Murder, Carnifex, Thy Art Is Murder and Dying Foetus. A great set, that has the crowd headbanging along with some great deliveries of tracks such as The Obsidian Architect, Adrenaline and The Void Alone.
But the crowd were here for one thing tonight, to see Ingested. The evening had been enjoyable so far, if somewhat static, as the crowd listened and enjoyed the performances so far. Oh boy, was that about to change.
Ingested hit the stage, and the atmosphere changed instantly Mancunian death metal machine exploded into life ! Vocalist Jason screams at the crowd to rise up and go wild. Everyone obliges and the atmosphere goes to 110% in an instant.
Their onstage energy is infectious as they blast through a setlist made up mainly from their latest album “The Tide of Death and Fractured Dreams” and 2022’s “Ashes Lie Still”. It always amazes me how many surfer you get at The Fleece with stage being so high, but with some effort, everyone clambers up and dives right back into the crowd. With no stewards, the crowd are great and look out for each other and support the divers – a great demonstration of the togetherness and nature of a metal crowd.
The set doesn’t pause for a moment, the power, the passion and energy doesn’t drop from start to finish with some incredible versions of the likes of The Divine Right of Kings and Better Off Dead.
The crowd were surfing, the mosh was swirling in the middle between the four central pillars and everyone was feeding off the pure energy. By the end everyone was sweaty and breathless.
A brilliant performance, from frankly one of the best live metal bands around right now.
