Dark Angel
3-Way Thrash

These days of confinement have rekindled my desire for thrash metal. Following this sentiment, I take a dive into the past and watch 3-Way Thrash with the help of the internet since I do not own the original 1990 videotape.

Three bands and three different ways of beating and strumming their instruments, live at the end of 1989 at the Hammersmith Odeon theater in London.

First up are the little-known D.A.M. (an acronym for Destruction and Mayhem), a British band with strong Bay Area vibes. Four songs from their debut Human Wreckage, presented to the audience with vigor and energy. The style isn’t anything innovative but the performance is convincing and serves as a good appetizer for what’s to come. They fully take advantage of the opportunity to open the concert at home and show they are aligned with more melodic and elegant bands, within what the genre allows, especially Flotsam and Jetsam. They will release another album the following year before disappearing for twenty years, followed by the usual reunion, as per the script of the last decade, but without new releases.

Next up are Candlemass! Many might wonder what they have to do with thrash, theoretically nothing, but it seems that back in the day they didn’t care about genre labels and they were right. After all, it's always metal!
Compared to the openers, it’s immediately apparent that we’re on another level: the band envelops the audience in a dark and austere atmosphere, which even translates while sitting comfortably on a couch at home in front of a smart TV, watching the file ripped from the ancient VHS, never mind all the high definition of this world. The tempos slow down and the band’s great classics advance like a colossus while Messiah Marcolin completely fills the scene. He sings his sermons in his enormous monk’s robe with solemnity and vigor; his theatricality is hypnotic and austere. Candlemass are at the peak of their career, fresh from the first four albums, opening with Dark Reflections, then The Bells of Acheron, and then the turn of the very sad Solitude from their debut, followed by Through the Infinite Halls of Death. Tales of Creation dominates the setlist at the expense of Nightfall, and finally, the atmosphere becomes even more rarefied and introspective with the closing A Tale of Creation.
A masterful performance, unfortunately too short, for a concert experienced as a support band to those at the opposite end of funereal doom.

And now it’s Dark Angel's turn.
They present themselves with the guitarists and bassist facing away and in the background the immense drum set of the immensely talented drummer: Gene Hoglan!
The massacre starts immediately: the abrasive riffs of Leave Scars chase each other in long progressions while the sound of the drums overpowers everything, and at the right moment Ron Rinehart jumps out from the wings, a big Yankee bull, that night was no joke in terms of build, between Gene and the paunch poorly hidden by Messiah Marcolin’s robe, who starts singing furiously. When the microphone goes silent, he angrily throws it away and without missing a beat grabs another, there’s plenty of time to catch up over the generous seven minutes of the title track from the latest studio album. Dark Angel has always composed very long songs, unlike many of their colleagues; they had a sense of proportion all their own.
As it continues, there’s the legendary The Burning of Sodom, with a textbook neck-breaking restart and blind fury more akin to Slayer; in fact, if the latter are number one, I comfortably assign the number two to Dark Angel. The set goes on with Never To Rise Again, during which Ron offers the microphone to the guys in the front row to shout the chorus at the top of their lungs, then The Death of Innocence and the sulfurous and less intricate Merciless Death. The difference is indeed quite marked between the two albums Darkness Descends and Leave Scars, the first being more direct and Slayer-like, as mentioned, and the second more technical and complex. The subsequent evolution, as many know, would further emphasize these characteristics with Time Does Not Heal, probably also due to Jim Durkin's departure, already absent in this live. For the avoidance of doubt, I have always adored the last album.
Before the last piece, We Have Arrived from their self-titled debut, during which Ron takes a stroll among the crowd, the microphone is handed to Gene, who as the boss makes his salute before ending on a high note.

About half an hour of music for Dark Angel, thus finishing the videotape. Therefore, the doubt arises that they weren’t the headliners, and to prove it, it’s worth knowing that Nuclear Assault also recorded a live video the same evening. Fifty minutes of concert under the name Handle With Care – European Tour ’89. For those present, it was certainly a great evening!