Arsenic Addiction + Cvltvs Mortem – June 25th, Bozeman, Montana

After not attending a show for almost 3 months we were starting to feel the need to drive somewhere and listen to some live Metal. Luckily for us Salt Lake City’s Arsenic Addiction, and Idaho-based Cvltvs Mortem where playing a show in town. There are NEVER decent Metal shows in Bozeman, Montana, and this one was a great opportunity to not have to drive 15 hrs for a show and check out two promising American bands that we would normally never get the chance to experience unless they opened for a bigger act.

The show was a the infamous Filling Station, a local watering hole that while it has it’s own ‘personality’ the place is very shitty in our opinion. So we made our way out of our dark cave in Bozeman, and arrived at the venue a few hours before the show so we could sneak an interview with Arsenic Addiction (Click HERE to listen to our 40 minute long interview).

After the interview we made our way back into the venue to enjoy some tasty beverages before the show started. While Bozeman, MT is not a place known for having many Metal heads (or at least real Metal heads, not that Emo / Metalcore kiddies), the crowd at the filling station was up to par with the other Metal shows we have seen in this place.

Arsenic Addiction took the stage around 10 pm or so and with their full stage setup and costumes. We particularly like when bands go out of their way into bringing their ‘music’ persona to life by wearing costumes or similar things. For us this is very essential in bands, and the American bands we have seen over the years do not bother to do this.

Wearing Victorian-inspired costumes the band quickly starts making a strong impression with a very solid execution of their “Requiem Of The Fallen” EP songs. The band now features keyboards but their use was minimal since Lady Arsenic focuses more on vocal duties. If you never heard of this band, you might be interested in finding out that her female vocalist actually does both the harsh and clean vocals. The harsh vocals are very brutal and sound more impressive in person, since you would never image that those hellish sounds come from such a small person.

Going over their EP songs and a few new songs, the band incorporates a bit of a stage show during, and in-between their songs (see our second clip from this show). Musically, the band does a great job in playing their songs and actually sounding like the band that went to the studio (unlike other bands). The stage show is just the extra icing on the cake for this young and promising band.

After the very intense set of Arsenic Addiction, the crowd made it back to the bar area in order to order tasty beverages and so did we.

The second band of the night was Idaho’s own Blackened Death Metal band Cvltvs Mortem. We have heard this band before in the same venue when they played a few years back with the all mighty and Montana’s Metal pride - Martriden. Back then, Cvltvs Mortem used to be named Sonic Devastation, and as far as we remembered gave a pretty decent show.

Taking the stage with their massive drum kit and corpse paint, the band provided a very drastic change of pace to the music of Arsenic Addition, but we welcomed the much needed live power of a Black/Death Metal band.

Cvltvs Mortem is a very solid band and all musicians know their shit. The drumming is massive and very well executed, the guitar riffing is top notch and fast as hell, the screams are ok, but not our particular cup of tea. In overall this band killed with their supper aggressive and fast as shit music. However, like with most Blackened Death Metal bands, it got a bit old after a few songs of very similar sounding music. We do not say this is a big problem, but for us, we prefer some variety in how the band songs being an album or a live performance. But if you were looking for something brutal and well played, Cvltvs Mortem is definitely a band you need to check-out.

The band played some of their older songs, and when we started recalling how was their ‘previous’ performance we quickly noticed that they have improved a lot since the last time and their music now is tighter than before.

Closing the night was a local band that we never heard of, but since we had to go to bed early we decided to say our goodbyes and call it a night. It was good to feel the ringing noise inside our ears that happens when driving back home after a late night of listening to live Metal music.

We would like to thank Lady Arsenic and the band for giving us the long interview and wish them (and Cvltvs Mortem) luck in their future endeavors and hopefully our paths cross again in another live show.

Check out some of our pictures of this show HERE.

And don’t forget to visit our YouTube channel for more music videos.

More info:

Arsenic Addiction http://www.myspace.com/arsenicaddiction666
Cvltvs Mortem http://www.myspace.com/cvltvsmortem

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