Taya Llewellyn
February 28, 2025| Harry Shiels |LIVE REVIEW
Live Review: Green Lung, Unto Others & Satan’s Satyrs | Marble Factory, Bristol | 17/02/2025
Announced as an additional accompaniment to their “biggest headline shows to date”, old Albion worshippers Green Lung drag moody goth lords Unto Others and stoner biker cult Satan’s Satyrs for a night of riffs in Bristol.
Satan's Satyrs
Making an incredibly rare appearance outside the US for an extended run, Virginian aggro doom biker cult Satan’s Satyrs make for the perfect opening act on paper for this European and UK excursion. The lights dim, the band storm the stage and start blasting through ‘Thumper’s Theme’, battering the audience with strobes as a short intro to their discography spanning set list. Switching gears into the psychedelic occult garage rock of ‘Full Moon and Empty Veins’, the band are leaving little time between songs for anything more than a “hey Bristol” and smashing through old favourites like ‘Pulp Star’ and ‘Two Hands’. They forego showing off much of their recently released After Dark, giving just lead single ‘Quick, Quiet Raid’ and album track ‘Iron & Ivy’.
The final stretch pulls in a few more favourites; a double helping of Die Screaming with ‘Black Souls’ and ‘Show Me Your Skull’, before bringing their thirty-minute set to an end with blistering debut album cut ‘Alucard’. Something wasn’t quite right tonight in Bristol, the band lacked a certain je ne sais quoi, perhaps a heft to their stoner/psych-doom/garage rock sound, but it is hard to quantify. Despite the sizeable chunk of the sold out audience turning up early, perhaps it was just a bit too cold in the old factory, the response garnered from those in attendance was polite, if indifferent. Unfortunately though, this left a slightly sour taste considering how uncommon it is to see Satan’s Satyrs in the flesh. What should’ve been a double barrel shotgun blast to the face of scorching 70s biker cult fury ended up feeling like a polite glove slap for a gentleman’s duel in the meadow.
Photo Credit: Taya Llewellyn
Satan's Satyrs
Unto Others
Unlike on their extended conquest of Europe, on this brief UK stint Portlands gothic metallers Unto Others are main support instead of co-headliners, this doesn’t stop Gabriel Franco and Co from putting on a searing set of goth tinged bliss. Their gloomy throwback blending Killing Joke with classic-era Misfits and touches of Type O Negative has been building a head of steam and act as a natural counterpart to Green Lung’s proto-metal, classic heavy metal worship.
Making their first stops back in the UK since releasing their lauded new album Never, Neverland, tonight’s set kicks off with the one two punch of openers: massive single ‘Butterfly’ and the chaotic metal beatings of ‘Mama Likes The Door Closed’. It is an eclectic mix up from the bands catalogue as they stuff their forty-five-minute set with eighteen tracks, using every second they have on stage to make a strong impression with plenty of new cuts as well as deeper dives. By a few tracks in Franco has the crowd eating out of the palm of his hand, oozing cheesy onstage charisma like he was ripped straight out of the early 90s.
Things are starting to heat up; ’Nightfall’ and ‘Jackie’ from debut Mana comfortably bookend recent ‘Fame’, flowing as gracefully as moody gothic metal anthems can. Speaking of anthems, recent single ‘Suicide Today’ is a huge crowd pleaser with fans and newcomers, followed by ‘Raigeki’ further solidifying their hold over the crowd. An extended run of older selections from their catalogue pleases die-hards and intrigues the first timers; ‘Why’ from 2021’s Strength followed by pulls from their pair of early Don’t Waste Your Time EP’s, ‘It Doesn’t Really Matter’ and ‘Can You Hear The Rain’. Strength opener ‘Heroin’ batters the crowd with heavy riffs and guttural roars followed by gargantuan album single ‘When Will God’s Work Be Done’.
Time is melting away as the last run on the set list brings the set to a head. ‘Time Goes On’ breaks the aggressive tension with melodic grandeur before being battered back into line with the bite-size urgency of ‘Flatline’. A cover of Ramones classic ‘Pet Sematary’ goes down a treat with the old punk rockers in the room and is suitably gloom’d out. Bringing their set to a close with another double scoop of debut album Mana, early singles ‘Give Me to the Night’ brings a heavy metal thunder juxtaposed with the emotional, melodic ‘Dragon, Why Do You Cry’.
When all is said and done, Unto Others ripped for forty-five minutes straight, packing in as much quality as you would expect from another headliner. It’s easy to see why they are on equal billing across mainland Europe, even if they’re not quite there yet in the UK right now, with sets like tonight’s it is clearly just a matter of time before Unto Others find themselves headlining the same spaces on their own merits.
Photo Credit: Taya Llewellyn
Green Lung
It feels like yesterday when we last saw Green Lung, just after the release of their smash-hit third album This Heathen Land back in 2023. At the time we espoused over a snapshot into the bands future, at what was one of their larger headline dates at the time, playing a rammed 1100 capacity KK’s Steelmill for their debut Wolverhampton show (comparatively playing the 400 capacity Thekla in Bristol on the same run). Although they put on a blinder of a set that night, it is safe to say that the band has only gone from strength to strength in the past year and a bit to end this tour cycle on a monolithic high note. The head of the Dorset Ooser towers over the back of the stage with their animal skull and Magpie mic stands, a (fake) large horned goat’s head in front of the drums and refreshed banners in the style of their newest album’s artwork, tonight feels like Green Lung truly stepping up to their homeland ambitions.
The now familiar sound of the eerie 70s synths of This Heathen Land’s prologue track stirs an air of excitement in the space to a fever pitch that erupts when the band take to the stage to massive cheers and break into album opener and irrefutable banger ‘The Forest Church’. Following the album run order with the heavy hooks of ‘Mountain Throne’ gets the heads banging, only dragged further into neck ringing heavy metal with ‘The Ancient Ways’. Vocalist Tom Templar was a charismatic enough frontman last time around, but the past year on this run has given him more (well deserved) confidence as he addresses the crowd and holds their attention with ease; introducing the first throwback from debut Woodland Rites and strong fan favourite ‘Call of the Coven’ back to back with ‘May Queen’ to huge cheers. In all honesty, it feels a bit silly to be calling any individual track a fan favourite, such is the adoration from their fan base that Green Lung could play any track and their fans would be singing the lyrics back at top volume.
As expected, they’re sounding phenomenal, everything is sat wonderfully where it is meant to be. Keyboardist/Organist John Wright had some additional percussion that was occasionally overpowered in the mix, but it was more funny than a problem hearing a tambourine out power Matt Wiseman battering the drums if only for a couple seconds. ‘Song Of The Stones’ acted as a momentary breather as the extended soft prog explorations enraptured the audience with a soothing atmosphere, Bassist and backing vocalist Joseph Ghast having a moment to shine leading the vocal chants in the song. All of a sudden with a hellacious “Oh Lord Yeah” and the weight of stampeding elephants sends Sabbathian worship ‘Woodland Rites’ tearing through the venue. The heft stays in place for the psychedelic and doom tinged fury of ‘Templar Dawn’, putting several necks in danger of shearing clean off the bodies they’re attached to.
Taking a moment as always to call for the freedom of access to Dartmoor National Park from privatisation and greed, the loving anthem to one of ancient Albion’s beloved spaces ‘Hunters In The Sky’ spells the inevitable end of tonight’s show. Followed by massive single ‘Maxine (Witch Queen)’, the soon-to-be iconic organ hook preludes a whole mess of boogieing and sing-alongs from the crowd. Closing their main set with the grandeur of Black Harvest’s lovelorn vampire anthem ‘Graveyard Sun’ leaves for a moment to breathe. Not long is spent rallying the crowd for an encore before Templar appears standing at the barrier in front of the crowd, serenading them with haunting Black Harvest intro ‘The Harrowing’, joining his bandmates on stage as the epic introduction builds the final fever pitch of tension exploding into the massive groove of ‘Old Gods’.
The whole crowd is moving in waves, headbanging in unison and paying tribute to the Green Lung’s heavy metal offerings, only to escalate further when prompted with ‘Let The Devil In’ unleashing elation across the sold-out crowd. With the promise of one last banger to end the night on a high, the unnerving retro-synths starting ‘One for Sorrow’ give way to pendulous riffs with chest-rumbling power. The song builds and when the breakdown comes in the second half the crowd erupts into a cathartic and messy mosh-pit as they’re smothered by doom-tinged riffs. Green Lung cannot be stopped, their biggest headline dates so far selling out well in advanced, go over as an undeniable success. A well crafted set list, tight as can be at the end of a lengthy tour cycle, it is clearly only a matter of time before the band are reaching even larger milestones and leaving venues of this size behind in their wake. Green Lung’s rise in popularity is a little mind-boggling considering how fast it happened, but there is absolute zero doubt that they deserve to be here as the next big thing.
Photo Credit: Taya Llewellyn
