Friday, November 16, 2007

5 Metal Female Voice Fest is back!

A few weeks ago, more precisely on 19 and 20 October 2007, the little village of Wieze, located in the middle of nowhere (well...near Brussels in fact) welcomed the 5th edition of the Metal Female Voice Fest. This festival is becoming more and more important over the years, but the atmosphere remains as great as it was before. What can you do in a Metal festival? Well, first of all you can eat and drink (not only beer! People are used to drinking a lot of...soft!), which is quite important consider that the festival goes on the whole day (and we wouldn't miss a group for anything!). You can also do a lot of other things, like listening to great music, meeting artists and greeting them, taking pictures with them, even talking to them (and not just about the weather!) and, of course, talking with other people, either in Dutch, English or German (yes yes! This festival is very famous abroad, that is why a lot of people come from France, Germany, the Netherlands or even Britain).




At this point, it seems important to explain what symphonic metal is. Take wonderful melodies, often played with keyboards or by a symphonic orchestra (80 musicians at least!), add heavy riffs of electric guitar and powerful hard drums. Then, mix everything up with a marvellous female voice singing lyrics which often talk about philosophy or mythology. Yes, you’ve got it! The most famous symphonic band is Nightwish (a Finnish band, as you will see, a lot of great bands come from Scandinavia or the Netherlands). Nightwish can be seen as a pioneering band in symphonic metal. Their first album, "Angels Fall First", was released in 1991.



They were soon followed by Within Temptation, a Dutch band, lead by Sharon Den Adel.



Back to Wieze. The 5th MFVF line-up was as remarkable and unique as expected. Among other bands: Walkyre, Imperia, Sirenia, Battlelore, but also Epica, Leaves’ Eyes and Delain. First of all, let’s talk about the Dutch metal band Epica. They mixed their wonderful music together with fireworks and pyrotechnics, huge energy and enthusiasm. The result? Amazing atmosphere with people clapping their hands and singing along with Simone, the lead singer. Leaves’ Eyes did the same, even though technical problems darkened their show. But as it was recorded for the purpose of their new DVD “En Saga i Belgica”, we can easily imagine engineers will solve the problem easily!
Anyway, we can thank the people who organize this amazing festival, full of wonderful music. When one listens to this music, one is flying towards another world of magic, fantasy and emotions. That is one of the aims of music, and I think the organisers of the MFVF have understood it. Let's hope next year's line-up will be as great as this one, so that MFVF will see me back!

7 comments:

Morgane said...

Happy to hear that somebody appreciates this kind of music here!

I went to the second and the 4th edition of this festival. The second one was by far my favorite: there was Nightwish! (they were playing just after Epica, you can imagine what a wonderful line-up it was!). The 4th one was funny, but less good.
I didn't come to this edition because After forever was cancelled, and I found it a bit expansive for the bands which were playing (the tickets for the second edition only costed 30 euros, with Nightwish and Epica!).

By the way, do you go to Antwerp next week to the concert of Epica and Sonata Artica? I'm really looking forward to it!

As far as my favourite bands are concerned, I really fancy Nightwish (my favourite album is Once; I'm less fond of their new singer), After Forever, Within Temptation (Mother Earth!), Sonata Arctica, Symphony X (Five and paradise Lost) and Rhapsody!

anso said...

Wonderful! I didn't know you were into that kind of music. Usually, people don't know or don't like ;-)

I'm sad to tell you that I don't go to Antwerp next week, I have hesitated a long time, but because I don't "zwem in het geld" (cfr Konnex!) I had to choose. I've already seen Epica twice or three time. I have never seen Sonata Artica on stage, but I hope doing so one day! As Nightwish is one of my favourite bands (as well as Within Temptation, Epica, Delain, Flowing Tears, Midnattsol, Angotria and Battlelore!), I'm looking forward to seeing Nightwish the 23 April in Atwerp (Lotto Arena).

Anyway , I wish you great concerts next week and enjoy it as much as possible!

bruno said...

I was at the second edition of the festival too! You should have told me, we would have met there! ;-)

As I'm writing (for the first time by the way), I'd just like to tell Anne-Sophie she's absolutely right, this music is great! But she already knows it, so... Well it was just for the sake of writing something!

MiKL said...

Hey!!!!!
Nightwish is defenitely my favorite band!!!
Anette Olzon is not too bad, even if I miss Tarja!
I'm also going to their concert in Antwerp in March with some of my friends from Ireland, who will come to see me in Belgium at that time.

Hey Morgane! I am not surprised to see a comment from you here! Don't forget you have to come with us to Antwerp! Don't hesitate!

Thanks a lot anso for this very nice article!

Hello to everybody; I'm looking forward to seeing you in January after this fantastic Erasmus exchange!
Bye bye

Mely said...

I'm glad to see that people like that kind of music too!
Nightwish, Sonata Artica, Epica,... they are all great!

Martin Cugnon said...

Speaking of female metal voice, do you know Otep
and Eths.
It's perhaps a bit more brutal ...
I do like bands like Nightwish too, but I must admit I prefer more hard-line stuff like Sepultura.

Morgane said...

I went to the live show of Sonata Arctica and Epica at Antwerp Saturday ! Sonata was absolutely great! But I'm a bit disappointed of Epica, the singer was not very good... I don't know what she had, but it seems like she was drugged, or drunk or ill. She was out of tune and her show was really bad compared to what I saw in the Female voices 2 and in the Metal Mean festival.
Hopefully I was really impressed by Sonata Arctica !! It was really great. The organisation was good too: we only had to wait 10 minutes between the bands (there were 3 bands).

Michael: I didn't forget the invitation for Nightwish ! But I'm a bit short of money for the moment... Do you think I can still wait or would it be quickly sold-out? Actually I'm really fond of their new singer... but I wonder how she'll song the old songs!