Autogigography, 22 December 2006: Support Delain - Underground, Lelystad (NL)
On the 22nd of December, we had the opportunity to be the support act for Delain, one of the rising stars on the horizon of (Gothic) Metal in the Netherlands. Delain is formed by former Within Temptation member Martijn Westerholt.
We were expected at around 18:00 but we arrived … early … 16:00 sharp, we presented ourselved at the back entrance of the Venue. We unloaded everything and met the very amiable people of Delain and their crew.
Delain’s set-up didn’t leave much room for us to play around with. We had to fit Kace’s drumset in between the keyboards of Martijn and the drums of Sander. To the right, you can see Sander’s drumkit, to the left, you can see some stands of Kace’s drumkit. We were standing up front and had very little space to move around in.
Delain’s sound check took more time than scheduled, but that’s only to be expected. When it was time for us to set-up, we moved Kace’s drumkit in. We had assembled it in the dressing room and took it on stage in three parts. Then we waited for the sound engineers to get the cables plugged which actually took a while because either the DI boxes were mislabeled or the stage hand could only count to ten and had trouble reading the numbers above 10. Anyway, after some delay, we got started and we soundchecked. It took a while to get a comfortable monitor mix but after almost an hour, we were done. Time to grab some food and prepare.
We got Chinese take-away which was actually very very good. We had these chinese cardboard cups you always see in American movies but this was the first time I’ve ever seen those on European soil. Anyway, enough talk about food.
We went on stage with our usual presentation act. Joop starts the intro, then Kace walks on stage followed a short while later by Rene and they start the groove. I had to come on early since I forgot to set my Pod to the right patch and had the volume pedal down. I came on, hit the patch, hit the volume and ripped into the melody. Carmen came on stage at the right time and we tore into “For hope is Still There”. I can’t really remember the rest of the set. The crowd was very good - people actually clapped the rhythm voluntarily during “Calling out the Gods” and they cheered during “Endgame”.
On-stage, we were plagued by a thundering hum through the monitors which, as we learned later, could be heard throughout the venue. Other than that, the gig was uneventful meaning that we’re becoming die-hard musicians :)
My wife was there to see us, and that made the show all the more special. A lot of familiar faces in the crowd too. A number of people actually showed up just to have a look at us.
After our gig, we tore the set down as fast as possible and made room for Delain. We hung around and loaded the cars around 23:00.
Another notch on my guitar!
And a really big hand for Carmen! She set a really good performance despite throat problems, the flue and an uncooperative digestive system (I’ll spare you the details). No whining but performing. What a lady!
