Live: SÓLSTAFIR w/ SOOTHSAYER… (Cyprus Avenue, Cork 28/10/2014) Posted: 21/11/2014 by John O'Brien

Cyprus Avenue fills up fairly quickly for a Tuesday night. It’s the first night of tour for Icelandic metal vets SÓLSTAFIR, and the stage area is littered with techs and band personnel, buzzing around and performing tentative checks, consulting nervously back and forth with engineers and venue personnel.

The expectation hangs heavy as a good number of people pull up to see Cork doom-metal outfit SOOTHSAYER hit stage. They don’t disappoint, as the five-piece contort and rage through a slow, truculent set taking in hefty, doomy squalls, taut and tense post-rock passages, and lean, dissonant passages of blackened noise, replete with piercingly atonal soloing from guitarist Con Doyle. Vocalist Liam Hughes flagellates his throat, staring transfixed at the crowd on the floor, pausing from his delivery only to manipulate his vocals, and at that, barely dropping his impressive stage presence. An incredible showing from a new cornerstone of Rebel metal.

As ‘Iron Man’ falls silent on the PA inbetween sets and gives way to gentle, yet fraught Icelandic folk to set the mood, SÓLSTAFIR cast distinctive figures as they trundle through the crowd to get to stage. The excitement of the first night of tour has hit them, and they rise to the occasion with an impressive set. Touring for new album “Otta”, the crux of the setlist is new material, which the band lay into with appropriate aplomb, the highlight of which is Homeric album-closer ‘Náttmál’, an eleven minute trawl through the depths of their psychedelic excesses that emerges with the highlight of the new album.

There’s a good amount of back catalogue material peppered throughout tonight’s set, with the band patiently putting an ear out for requests during breaks for tuning, interacting with longtime fans. Strident rock ‘n’ roll is the order of the day, however, and not without a bit of banter for good measure. Though they’re initially unsure of the traditionally reserved Irish metal audience, Cork warms quickly to the quartet, who respond in kind, even busting out the banjo live for the very first time in their twenty-year run for the new LP’s title-track, to devastating effect. By the time two hours have blurred past, SÓLSTAFIR leave the stage heroes, having conquered a new audience like the Vikings they’ve so often taken as muse.

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Review by Mike McGrath-Bryan.
Photos by Shane J Horan.

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SÓLSTAFIR – https://www.facebook.com/solstafirice
SOOTHSAYER – https://www.facebook.com/soothsayerdoom

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