Praised to be the only show in Germany until mid-2026 by Canadian black metal shooting stars Spectral Wound I was pretty excited to get there to see them. I had never seen them before so my expectations were pretty high. Also the opening band, German The Great Sea, I actually didn't know before. Checking their debut album "The Noble Are Of Desolation" which was released this year in spring let me hope for a good show.

So the time had come to see the Germans on stage. First they appeared to be a little bit shy in front of the audience but they did a really good job. Their vocalist was the centerpoint of the band and with every minute he got warmer with the audience and felt more and more comfortable. At least I had that feeling. Musically The Great Sea played a very intense sort of melancholic hateful black metal (maybe best to compare with bands like Harakiri For The Sky or Karg) and was the album already really good they convinced me even more live. This was a really cool show and with that one they found a new fanboy in me.

Setlist: Upright In Nothing / Eden Unfolded / No Peace Among Men / The Maze / Walking At The Edge Of Death

Now this was hard to top. When Spectral Wound entered the stage they were cheered by the audience (by the way, the location wasn't sold out that evening, don't know if it depended on the fact that it was a Thursday or the amount of gigs in the Ruhr Area has become that much after the pandemic again). The Canadians started with a lot of fog and illumination and did a really solid gig that evening. The backing vocals were a little bit weak though but the rest of the sound was okay. Vocalist Jonah was whirling on the stage and did a performance full of hatred and poisonous vocals. Also the rest of the band was performing quite well but that evening the winner for me was The Great Sea.

Unfortunately I didn't get the setlist so I looked up on the internet and this is the average setlist by Spectral Wound in 2025 I found. Don't know if it's correct the way you can read it below:

Fevers And Suffering / Woods From Which The Spirits Once So Loudly Howled / Aristocratic Suicidal Black Metal / Frigid And Spellbound / Less And Less Human, O Savage Spirit / A Coin Upon The Tongue / Twelve Moons In Hell

What is left to say is that it is cool that the Junkyard is back in the metal scene with really cool concerts. One of the next highlights will be Cryptopsy in January and Hellripper with Schizophrenia plus Sarcartor in April. (Un)Holy shit!!!