BARONESS at Beta in Copenhagen, Denmark

One of my favorite bands – Baroness – is touring across Europe as an opening act for Volbeat. To fill in the gaps in the calendar and get closer to their fans band decided to book the shows headlined by them in much closer to the fan’s environment and to promote their latest album ‘Golden & Grey’. The extra show in Copenhagen was booked in the very last moment at BETA (sister venue for Copenhagen’s Amager Bio) and the tickets were sold out almost immediately.

When I arrived at the venue the club was almost completely full, with the stage room still closed and the metal classics provided by DJ Dark Horse entertaining the crowd sipping the beer in the venue hall and in front of the bar. The doors to the stage room were opened by no one else by Sebastian – Baroness drummer – and the crowd started slowly to float in setting themselves as close to the small stage as the could. I was lucky enough to secure the front row on time and wait for the band to hit the stage.

Nick Jost and Sebastian Thomson were the first to enter the stage and received the first wave of applause, then with the much louder cheer, we saw Gina Gleason with her white Fender Telecaster followed shortly by the brain of the whole operation – John Baizley. The band started with ‘Throw Me an Anchor’ and the venue started to get crazy. The atmosphere was steaming hot when John was screaming out ‘You’d throw me an anchor, And hope I’d learn’. The band continued with ‘A Horse Called Golgotha’ and the fun continued – Gina started to interact with the fans and bowing down into the crowd, Nick was doing everything to maintain the same level of interaction and the fans were paying them back with their reaction.

The peak of the crowd reaction was reached when the first notes of ‘March to the Sea’ were played – the temperature inside was very high what was an outcome of emotions and small, fully packed club. It was the time to get to the back of the venue and replenish the liquids. Baroness continued to please the fans with their amazing mixture of gentle and harsh sounds and screamed out lyrics delivering few tracks from the last record and their biggest hits including a mixture of songs from an amazing ‘Purple’ record like ‘Shock Me’ or ‘Chlorine & Wine’.

The venue was so packed that it was hard to see anything from the back but the sound was still arriving as expected. After closing the main part of the gig with ‘The Gnashing’ band left the stage for a quick break to shortly get back and play an encore. And this time the encore was simply amazing – John and company delivered three amazing pieces from first three albums they have released – first an aggressive ‘Sweetest Curse’ from ‘Blue’, then a classic ‘Isak’ from ‘Red’ to close with the Baroness evergreen ‘Take My Bones Away’. The night was finished after last notes of the song faded and the bandleader said as usual after the gig ‘we are Baroness from Savannah, Georgia’ after which he thanked the fans.

The summary of the show is going to be very short – Baroness delivered as always, fans enjoyed the gig and what was really awesome – band enjoyed playing that night as well, what is quite a surprise knowing that they are on tour since September. Maybe it was the pleasure of playing without time curfew set by the headliner. Definitely, no one who was lucky enough to get tickets regretted spending this night at Beta.

Photos and Review by Kasper Pasinski