BLACK SABBATH… and more @ BST, HYDE PARK, LONDON, 4th July 2014

It was in the heat of summer and hidden away in the corner of Hyde Park the crowd gathered in their masses, ready for British Sabbath Time. Having been transformed into a little village with bars and food stalls being designed to look like streets filled with pub fronts and restaurants, Hyde Park was to host something rather awesome.

Whilst taking the time to explore the arena, I soon discovered that behind one of the make shift pub fronts lay the Barclaycard Theatre, a venue within a venue and it was The Bots who kicked off my day of music.

It’s always going to be difficult being amongst the opening acts at a festival, let alone one that has such an impressive line-up, however The Bots played to a decent sized audience as brothers Mikaiah Lei and Anaiah Lei perform their two piece garage punk with a youthful energy and a great way to get things started.

For me personally though today was always going to be about the Main Stage, the first act of which were Max Cavelaras’ Soulfly and their tribal infused metal. It had been a while since I had seen Max on a bigger stage and the ex Sepultura/Nailbomb frontman certainly seemed to be enjoying himself, but it was the riffs of “Back to the Primitive” and “Tribe” that really got the pit going.

Then it was the first of the Sepultura songs with “Arise”, before Max Caveleras’ son Zyon was replaced on drums by Max’s brother and ex-Sepultura bandmate Igor Cavalera for the Sepultura classic “Roots Bloody Roots”, although despite being considered one of the best metal drummers in the world Igor seemed somewhat half-hearted and Soulfly were at their best performing their own tracks, ending the set with a blinding version of “Eye for an Eye” back from the first Soulfly album.

Given the number of times I’ve seen Motorhead over the years part of me felt maybe I should have been checking out more of the smaller bands, so although having delved in to see a brief glimpse of Broken Hands and watch a bit of the First I still decided it would be rude of me not to go back to the main stage.

Opening up with “Damage Case” and “Stay Clean” Lemmy then dedicated “Over the Top” to everyone that made a noise (along with himself) before Phil Campbell slowed things down with his bluesy guitar intro for “Lost Women Blues” taken from the most recent Motorhead studio album.

It was then time for a Micky Dee drum solo during “Doctor Rock” followed by the fast and furious rock n roll on “Going to Brazil” as well as Whitfield Crane (of Ugly Kid Joe and Life of Agony fame) providing guest vocals for the brilliant “Killed by Death”.

Although it’s not quite the same seeing Motorhead outdoors at a festival rather than being deafened inside a sweaty Guildhall, inevitably there was still a stampede for “Ace of Spades” and as “Overkill” brought the set to a close this was a fairly routine performance (albeit stripped down to nine songs) showing that despite recent health issues Lemmy and co have most definitely still got it.

During the late eighties and early nineties Faith No More gained quite a cult following, so rather appropriately they took to the stage in their vicar outfits as Mike Patton addressed the congregation with rather more inappropriate, yet amusing, quotes from the Exorcist.

It was couple of songs in when Faith No More brought out “Epic” and as the large crowd witnessed the bands’ first gig in two years, there was a definite feel good element to Faith No More and with Patton insisting on the metal crowd singing along to the Commodores “Easy” this was a perfect moment for a sunny afternoon.

Although today’s line-up was something of a nostalgia trip Faith No More also aired a couple of new songs bringing out the experimental side of Mike Patton, but it was the funky “We Care a Lot” that quite rightly ended the Faith No More encore.

With a bit of time to kill I was pleased to have made it to the Village Hall for the psychedelic sounds of Japans Bo Ningen, the tent was filled to capacity but the size of the queue shows how they’ve continued to make a name for themselves with their seventies influenced noise.

It may have been hot and sticky but the wall of noise from Bo Ningen was mesmerizing as always, their third full length album simply entitled “III” has been receiving rave reviews and several tracks were performed alongside those from “Line the Wall” and the self-titled debut release from 2009 with songs such as “Koroshitai Kimochi” becoming a hypnotic jam.

It was then back to the main stage and the nineteen nighties with Soundgarden celebrating the twentieth anniversary of their classic album “Superunknown” by performing it in full and a set that had me hooked from beginning to end.

Although “Superunkown” moved Soundgarden away from their more out and out grunge beginnings it is definitely their greatest work, the album being played in the same order as it appears on record starting with “Let me Drown” and Cornell often giving the backstory when introducing tracks such as “Mailman” and “Limo Wreck”.

Like some of the bands earlier in the day, there’s another special guest as Pearl Jam/Mad Season guitarist Mike McCready joined the band for the albums’ title track and the Soundgarden set just got better and better, I’ve always loved Cornells voice and during the likes of “Black Hole Sun” and “Spoonman” it’s sounding as good now as it does on record.

It may have still been daylight when Black Sabbath took to the stage, but this was what the festival was all about, the video screens setting the mood as the instantly recognisable “War Pigs” got the main event started with the vast crowd singing along to every word.

Having formed from humble beginnings back in the late 1960’s Black Sabbath soon became one of the undisputed pioneers of heavy metal, the list of artists they have influenced either directly or indirectly is endless yet there has never been anyone quite like them and as such Black Sabbath have stood the test of time.

There may have been moments where the vocals of Ozzy Osbourne were a little off during “Into the Void” and “Snowblind” but it didn’t matter, put the distinctive voice of Ozzy over Tony Iommi’s guitar and Geezer Butlers bass and you get Black Sabbath sound no matter what.

Last years’ studio album from Black Sabbath had two songs played tonight, the first of which “Age of Reason” sounds as though it too was written back in the day and with that Ozzy was in the zone – he may not move around as much as he used too but with Iommi’s ability to make evil riffs look easy during the likes of “Black Sabbath” along with the amazing finger picking bass-lines of Geezer Butler (including the crazy intro for “N.I.B”) this soon became one of the gigs of the summer.

It’s a shame that contractual disagreements meant original drummer Bill Ward is missing from the fold and although Rage Against the Machine’s Brad Wilk did a grand job on the album, it was Tommy Clufetos from Ozzy’s solo band behind the kit this evening and considering he’s not an official member of Black Sabbath he certainly had Hyde Park eating out the palm of his hand during an amazing solo for “Rat Salad”.

Following the mighty “Iron Man” it was time for Iommi to pull another stroke of genius out the bag from “13” with the epic “God is Dead?” and as the main set ended with “Children of the Grave” it only meant one thing for the encore…

So as “Paranoid” brought the night to a close on what has been strongly rumoured as the beginning of the end, here’s hoping that if Black Sabbath are to call it day that it’s not too long until we get treated to another reunion tour as good as this one.