Head-Bangers and Mosh

By: Jaiveer Hundal

The coliseum at the Hardrock Hotel, Sentosa. It was 7:30 pm, the vendors had set up along the back wall of the outdoor courtyard.

The opening act stepped on promptly at 8pm. Crossfaith, led by Kenta Koie, took the Hardrock by storm as they released a wall of music upon the masses. Made of equal parts passion and sound, the Japanese artists began their musical pilgrimage into the souls of everyone present at the coliseum. Not before long, the tumultuous metal anthems began rocking the land and on behalf of metal heads everywhere, baptized newcomers as one of their own. From the onset, thrashers everywhere displayed their horns and never let them fall. The evening progressed and the music got louder. Soon a majority of those present found themselves deep in a mosh pit that had sprouted up at the feet of the musical deities they had come out to worship.

At 9 pm, Bring me the horizon came on, as the metal scene shifted continents with the boys from Sheffield taking over. Oliver Sykes led his brothers as they unleashed their own variation of metal core on their ever more demanding devotees. The psychedelic lights added a hellish effect to the coliseum, the denizens of the night transformed into frenzied maenads. As the night wore on, the mosh pit returned as more and more people joined in on the ritual. There was a certain order to the chaos, a subtle choreography in the insanity, that looked to the music as a choir would a conductor. When the lights went out to the chants of “encore”, the band did not disappoint. They came out for one final song and sent Singapore home with a rocking lullaby.