CHAOS & CARNAGE 2024: CATTLE DECAPITATION / CARNIFEX / RIVERS OF NIHIL / HUMANITY'S LAST BREATH / THE ZENITH PASSAGE / VITRIOL / FACE YOURSELF

CHAOS & CARNAGE 2024 closed out at the House of Blues in Las Vegas, and the final night of the tour brought out some extra excitement and pranks from the bands. Musicians coming out on stage and messing around with each other, one come out with a pillow and blanket and pretend like he was sleeping onstage during a set, a roadie was dressed like a cockroach while setting up Cattle Decapitation... Fun stuff, obviously having a good time for the tour finale. There were seven bands on the show, the doors were open at a very early 4pm with the first band FACE YOURSELF taking the stage at 4:30.

Musicians coming out on stage and messing around with each other, one come out with a pillow and blanket and pretend like he was sleeping onstage during a set, a roadie was dressed like a cockroach while setting up Cattle Decapitation... Fun stuff, obviously having a good time for the tour finale.

NYC deathcore act FACE YOURSELF was unfortunately were without their female vocalist Yasmine Liverneaux Belkhodja, who was unable to make the tour, so filling in was guitarist Corey Doremus, who has been taking on vocals for most of this tour. Yasmine is a beast on vocals and a rising star in this genre, but the band sounded great with Doremus and really got the crowd going, with selections from their three (yes three) 2023 EPs.

VITRIOL is more extreme metal than death metal, and delivered a blistering performance. The duo of bassist/vocalist Adam Roethlisberger and guitarist/vocalist Kyle Rasmussen are the heart and soul of this band and work so well together. They commented Vegas was the best time of the entire tour! A great band and took things to another level.

THE ZENITH PASSAGE is a death metal band from Los Angeles currently signed to Metal Blade Records, and as Vitriol left the stage they claimed, “If you want to see a band that can fucking play their instruments, stick around for The Zenith Passage.” This band has passion, and played the longest song of the night, an epic10 minute version of "Divinerta I & II", a masterful composition that really showed their musical prowess.

Deathmetal/doomcore HUMANITY'S LAST BREATH is a different kind of beast, and totally captured my attention and blew me away. I was not even sure the singer was even human, as he took to the stage, hunched over, in a black robed hooded outfit with the most insane guttural sounds coming from him. The band's sound was brutal, dark and scary, and their stage show was just insane and totally won me over as a new fan. The headbanging was reaching a fevered pitch, as the pit grew, and the night was really getting wild.

RIVERS OF NIHIL took things in another direction with a death core fusion sound, otally surprised me with the addition of Justin Klunk on Saxophone, which made me wonder how the crowd would react to this, after the dark moody set by Humanity's Last Breath. But the crowd seemed to love this different sound and cheered each time the sax man appeared onstage. The tech death sound with the added sax was totally different than the first bands, and really brought another dimension to the show.

Legends in the deathcore sound, CARNIFEX was a huge favorite, you could tell the moment they hit the stage. The crowd loved this band, and Carnifex gave it back with a blistering brutal set that started with "Salvation is Dead” from 2014's Die Without Hope, with insane vocals from frontman Scott Ian Lewis. They followed with “Dark Days", another brutal sounding song from the same CD, and continued with "Dragged Into the Grave.” The band played a varied set from their long metal history, and though their set was longer than the previous 5 bands it was still short at just 10 songs, I just wanted to hear more!

Necromanteum's “Torn in Two” was a nice touch, and they closed out their show with “Drown Me in Blood” from Slow Death. Carnifex showed why they are deathcore superstars, and set the stage for the final act of the night.

Legendary deathgrind as CATTLE DECAPITATION hit the stage, the final band of the night, who opened with “Terrasitic Adaptation”, a full blown in your face song that made you catch your breath, and followed with “We Eat Our Young”, both from the 2023 release Terrasitic, and again just plain brutal. Travis Ryan was in full force mode, and the grind was strong, as the pit was out of control and the front row a mass of flying hair. The band's set was just nine songs, but epic from start to finish, closing with 2012’s, “Kingdom of Tyrants”. Fans were exhausted but happy, with the finale of the 2024 Chaos & Carnage Tour once again in Las Vegas.