Review and photos by Aki Fujita Taguchi

Proofreading by Yosuke Taguchi

Glaswegian metal band Bleed From Within brought their tour to Tokyo last weekend. They played at Cyclone on Saturday and then at Garret on Sunday. I was fortunate enough to experience their wild gigs for 2 days. Both venues are located in Shibuya area, the most popular town for young people in Tokyo. You can find many cool music venues there. Cyclone opened in 1997 with 300 capacity and it is well known for relatively heavy and loud music. Garret opened in 2013 as a sister venue of Cyclone with the same capacity. You can enjoy various types of music here.

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Bleed From Within are a heavy metal band formed in 2005, in Glasgow, Scotland. I felt the influence of deathcore from their earlier works, but their musical style has sifted to a mix of metalcore, melodic death metal and groove metal. Especially, if you listen to Scott Kennedy’s vocal style, it’s obvious.

On the Japan tour, Bleed From Within were supported by Italian metalcore band Despite Exile. They are a 5-piece band from Udine, Italy. I really enjoyed their shredding riffs and epic melodies. I believe it won’t take so long until Despite Exile are headlining Japan tour.

Now finally Bleed From Within appeared on the stage just after 9. They started with ‘Clarity’, the first track from the latest record ‘Era’, which was released in 2018 as their 4th studio album. When they moved on to ‘Crown of Misery’, one young Japanese guy climbed up on the stage. (Basically that kind of activity is banned at this venue.) At that moment, they shot a happy look at that. They seemed to be satisfied with the fact that Japanese audience were wilder than they had thought.

Their set mainly consisted of their last two albums, ‘Era’ (Century Media, 2018) and ‘Uprising’ (Century Media, 2013). They thrashed around the stage, and Kennedy’s growling voice was full of energy, passion and anger. That’s exactly what we want from a metalcore show! The crowd was completely controlled by his voice and made a circle pit consistently throughout the show. The whole floor went chaotic by young metalheads.

I was surprised to see that they were genuine showmen. They interacted with the crowd as much as they could and also made cool poses for me. How professional they are! We were very lucky to see one of the biggest Scottish metal bands at these intimate venues.

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I must mention that the band finished with an encore of ‘Servants of Divinity’ from their 1st album ‘Humanity’ only on Sunday. It’s very rare they play this tune in the recent shows. But they accommodated a request from their dedicated fans and played it with Jacopo, the vocalist of Despite Exile. The audience really appreciated this surprising gift with enthusiasm.

It was the absolutely fabulous and inspiring weekend for those who joined these shows. I guess they were too wired to get to sleep. I believe without a doubt that next time Bleed From Within come to Japan, they will perform at much bigger venue.

They will go on tour China until 13th March. Make sure to check out a date on their website.

Bleed From Within official website: https://bleedfromwithin.com

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/bleedfromwithinband

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Member:

Scott Kennedy - Vocals

Ali Richardson - Drums

Craig ‘Goonzi’ Gowans - Guitars

Davie Provan - Bass

Steven Jones - Guitars / Vocals

Setlist: (3rd March)

Clarity

Crown of Misery

Uprising

Afterlife

Cast Down

III / Colony

I Am Oblivion

Last of Our Kind

Shiver

It Lives In Me

Alone in the Sun

Ruina

Alive

Encore:

Servants of Divinity

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Bleed From Within at Garret in Tokyo, on 3rd March, 2019

Bleed From Within at Cyclone in Tokyo, on 2nd March, 2019