AVENGED SEVENFOLD/POPPY/SULLIVAN KING – MOHEGAN SUN

By Kat Gullage

Avenged Sevenfold brings their “Life Is But A Dream” tour for the first time to the Mohegan Sun Arena with Poppy and Sullivan King for direct support.

Genesis 4:24 “If Cain shall be avenged sevenfold, truly Lamech seventy and sevenfold.” This bible verse refers to the punishment God would give to anyone who killed the remorseful Cain. It is also the origin of the Avenged Sevenfold (A7X) moniker.

A7X made a stop in Uncasville on their sixteen date, third leg of the “Life Is But A Dream…” tour. It was their first time at this venue, and their ravenous fans hadn’t seen them perform live in five years. They were ready.

Sullivan King opened the show. Sorry to say I only caught the end, but it was EDM merged with metal. The DJ also played decent guitar and scream growled into a mic. The light show was rave worthy, the bass was bangin and it was loud as fuck. Two guys sitting next to me said it went on “in your face” for forty-five minutes.

Poppy was up next. Her journey began as a viral YouTube star, leading the way to her music career that includes five studio albums. Her sound is a merger of EDM and heavy industrial metal chords. Poppy’s voice mimics that, sometimes candy sweet and quiet, sometimes powerful throaty growls. I couldn’t decipher what she actually sang versus what was pre recorded as the mix was heavy on the enhancement. Poppy’s setlist included twelve songs from three of her five studio LPs. She wore a white skin tight bodysuit, red on one leg from the knee up, with exaggerated billowy short sleeves and white fingerless gloves.

Poppy kicked it off with “BLOODMONEY” from I Disagree, “Church Outfit” off of Zig, “Bite Your Teeth”, and title cut “I Disagree”. Poppy moves and bounces the length of the stage. The visuals are bright and stimulating but don’t compare to Sullivan King’s lasers or what I expect A7X to be packing. There’s the occasional smoke stacks but they don’t contribute much. I could see guitarist/back up vocalist, Nicolas Perez, seems to have great sync with Poppy. The drummer, however, Ralph Alexander, immediately grabs my attention. Lotta magic happening over there. I was very impressed by him.

“X” off of Am I A Girl? Is followed by “Hard” from Zig, “Sit/Stay” another I Disagree track is served up. Poppy does not address the crowd at all during the set. “V.A.N.” a Bad Omens cover is thrown into the mix. Poppy wraps it up with four more songs, including three more from I Disagree. “Fill The Crown”, “Anything Like Me”, “Scary Mask” – from her five song EP, Choke, and “Concrete”. Poppy was loud, entertaining and a perfect segue from Sullivan King to A7X.

Me to my kid, Lil KAT: Poppy opened for Avenged Sevenfold.
Lil KAT: Give her my phone number! Tell her to hit my line! She’s on my playlist! (pulls up “Girls in Bikinis”)

Mohegan Sun Arena has a capacity of 10,000. The shows I usually attend have the floor area 100% open and seats everywhere else. For this event only half of the floor, the front half, was an open pit. Behind that was just rows of assigned folding chairs. What the hell? I thought that was crazy. We expect the full open space at these types of shows. The folding seat folks ended up having to stand all night to see over the pit peeps.

The place was packed, looked like a full house. The fans were buzzing in anticipation when A7X took their places onstage to a recording of “Nightcall” (Kavinsky). The ginormous screens came alive with images and lyrics before they blew the doors off the place with a near perfect rendition of “Game Over” off their new LP Life Is But A Dream. Singer M. Shadows had this black Kanye mask over his entire head, although his voice cracked a coupla quick times during the song, I don’t think that was the reason. Also, M. has the most adorable dimples and that mask robbing us of the view.

“Mattel”, also from Life, was up next. The screens filled with images of a cute house that morphed into a haunted house that morphed into a house on fire. The robust set of fifteen songs from seven of their eight studio LPs rolled on with fan favorite “Afterlife”, a track from Avenged Sevenfold. A huge hand that looked like it was coming toward us appeared as M. shouted “Connecticut! We’re gonna hafta work on this energy level.”.

The band: M. Shadows (Matthew Sanders) vocals, Zacky Vengeance (Zachary Baker) rhythm guitar, Synyster Gates (Brian Haner Jr.) lead guitar, Johnny Christ (Jonathan Seward) and Brooks Wackerman on drums are firing on all cylinders. M. to the crowd “I wanna thank Mr. Brooks Wackerman for coming out here tonight. Brooks was so sick yesterday he couldn’t get outta bed. So thank you Brooks for fuckin manning up and playing the show tonight. And if the show stops or the drums stop, you know it was your fault (points to us) and he’s probably dead.” Brooks bangs the drums a bit.

M. continues “Oh Mohegan Sun. That guy right there, would tell me every night (points at guy up front in the pit) we play XBox together, he’d be like ya gotta play the Mohegan Sun bro, it’s the best place. I live in Orange County, I’m like what the fuck is a Mohegan Sun? OK, a casino? So we booked this tour originally for an arena down the road and he said you gotta fuckin play the Mohegan Sun. So, here we are. And this one’s for you, “Hail To The King”. The fans erupt at the first notes of the title track.

Back to Life for “We Love You” as lyrics pop up on the huge cinematic canvasses again. This heavy track was our editor’s pick of the set. A too long intro gives way to “Shepherd Of FIre” off of Hail To The King. Now band members morph into demons, in real fucking time, on the screens. “Does Connecticut fuck with The Stage?” The title track is up next with fiery images flying at us. “Roman Sky” off of City of Evil started beautifully with amazing Roman architectural and planetary graphics, but M.’s voice gave out a bit on the high notes.

It took forever to start the next song up, another City cut, “Blinded in Chains”. The fans roared during the awkward pause but my editor commented “Maybe the drummer did die.” Back to the demon morphing images, a modern take on A-ha’s “Take on Me” video. M. states “Let’s just press play on that record.” The audience loses their shit for “Bat Country” and a real pit breaks out. Back to Life for “Nobody”, my pick of the set. Flawless rendition, graphics simplified to just black and white images. Syn starts chewing on a broken string that snapped during the solo.

Title track “Nightmare” fires up the fans again and crowd surfers top off the pit action. The audience enthusiastically chimes in with the chorus “your fucking nightmare!”. M. then gives Brooks another shout out and he does a quick burst of a solo. They visit Waking The Fallen with “Unholy Confessions” and M.’s voice is on point. The show wraps with “Save Me” from Nightmare backed by a smoky cemetery scene, and “Cosmic” off of Life, a good choice for a cool down song complete with blue wavy images. They thank their adoring fan base and exit the stage. There is no encore.

Me to Lil KAT: I’m reviewing Avenged Sevenfold.
Lil KAT: How many tickets did you get? Their graphics go hard!

Avenged Sevenfold is a tight unit and puts on an awesome live show. M.’s voice may have glitched a few times but otherwise he sounded great. And he flexes it night after night after night. Their graphics do go hard! They really are the frontrunners for rock bands and technology. They have an immersive concert, “Looking Inside”, meant for use with VR and it’s actually them, not avatars! There’s an A7X hub in Fortnite and fans are also invited to join their Discord.

Recently, they created a rewards plan for fans! (Take note all other bands!) You can earn points for every purchase: music, tickets, merch, etc. and use the points for everything from posters to meet and greets! If you can catch fan loving A7X live, I guarantee you won’t be disappointed.

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