I only have a few shows on my Year of the Mosh left. But this was one show that I was looking forward to. I mean fuck, you don’t get to see legends like this every day. So, I returned to XL Live for some German heavy metal, courtesy of Solingen, Germany’s (a town that I have visited) very own – Accept. And man, the wait was so fuckin’ worth it!

Narcotic Wasteland

Opening for Accept was Narcotic Wasteland, a death metal act from South Carolina. I thought that their set was alright – kinda run-of-the-mill in all honesty. I’ve heard bands like them before, but they weren’t horrible. I thought that their song “You Will Die Alone” was pretty neat, arguably the best song of their set. “Morality and the Wasp” wasn’t that bad either. But beyond that, I don’t recall many other stand-out songs from their set.

I will say this though: It was incredibly reassuring to see a bald guy head-banging on stage. I began losing my hair and tried over-the-counter methods to keep my hair. But after about 5-6 months of not seeing results, I decided to bite the bullet and shave it all off. While I’ve gotten used to having no hair, headbanging became something that I was incredibly self-conscious about. I’ve seen videos of bald metalheads headbanging – Exodus’s former vocalist, Rob Dukes, performing at Wacken in 2008 being one of them. However, seeing their vocalist headbanging on stage – in person – was, again, incredibly reassuring for me. I felt a bit more confident that I can still headbang while not having hair.

Accept

Shortly after Narcotic Wasteland’s set, Accept took to the stage. Fuckin hell, these guys know how to put on a show. Even with not that big of a turnout, Accept really went balls to the wall (pun intended) with their performance. What made this even better was that Mark Tornillo was back in the lineup. While on this tour, Tornillo came down with an illness, and I was wondering if he would be back for this show. For this show, Tornillo was back on vocals, and fuck, for someone damn near his 70’s (as of when I’m writing this), he’s got one hell of a piercing set of pipes.

Accept played songs like “Midnight Lover” and “Overnight Sensation” early on in their set. Towards the end of their set, the gang played “Princess of the Night” and “Teutonic Terror”. And of course, how could they not play the iconic “Balls to the Walls” during their encore? For a band that has been going for quite some time, Accept doesn’t seem to have lost any of its spirits. Hell, I had so much fun getting to see them that I forgot how much time had even passed. Time really blows by you, when you’re having fun!

Conclusion

This show was a ton of fun! It felt like a real blast from the past – like I was rediscovering metal for the very first time! Between the energy, the passion, and the intensity, it felt like a show lifted straight out of the 1980s. I could now easily see how Accept was someone else’s introduction to metal. I’m beyond glad that I got to see this show! As I said, it’s pretty rare that you get to see legends like this!