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Concert Photo Review: DRAGONFORCE with UNLEASH THE ARCHERS And VISIONS OF ATLANTIS @ Regency Ballroom – San Francisco, California

By capitalchaostv on March 13, 2020 • ( 0 )

Tonight I had the pleasure to attend the Dragonforce show at the Regency Ballroom in San Francisco. To my surprise, the music venue was full almost to the point of looking like a near sold out show, which was surprising to me because of the current coronavirus scare in San Francisco ( and the rest of the world), which has a lot of people taking precautions and trying to avoid big crowds or events all together.

First up that night was symphonic metal band VISIONS OF ATLANTIS from Austria. VISIONS OF ATLANTIS is an Austrian-French-Italian Symphonic Metal band that was formed in August 2000 in the beautiful town of Bruck an der Mur. VISIONS OF ATLANTIS have featured harmonies of male and female vocals since the beginning of their career, which makes them extraordinary and distinctive from other bands of the genre. This band has been around for awhile and since the bands creation back in 2000 they have put out seven studio albums two EPs and nine music videos.

As soon as the band got up the stage, Clémentine Delauney (female vocals) caught my eye with her very cool stage outfit that reminded me of an elvish wizard/mage. They opened with the song The Deep & the Dark of their 2018 album of the same title, it had a very catchy and powerful chorus sung by both vocalist that you couldn’t help and join in and sing along, and I also loved the power metal guitar riffs. I believe The Deep & the Dark was an excellent choice to open the show and get the crowd going.

The band followed up by the song New Dawn of their 2011 album Delta. Visions of Atlantis played a mix of old and four new tracks from their new album Wanderers and ended the set with the fan favorite song from their previous album Return to Lemuria. I really like that fact that VISIONS OF ATLANTIS has two very talented vocalist (male and female), their voices blend together wonderful with the bands style. Clémentine Delauney has been with Visions of Atlantis Since 2013 and Exit Eden Since 2017 while Michele Guaitoli has been with VISIONS OF ATLANTIS since 2018 also does vocals for Temperance since 2018, Overtures since 2003 and Kaledon since 2003.

Visions of Atlantis are:

Clémentine Delauney – vocals

Michele Guaitoli – vocals

Christian Douscha – Guitars

Herbert Glos – Bass

Thomas Caser – Drums

Set list of songs played at Regency Ballroom in San Francisco 3-8-2020

1) The Deep & The Dark

2) New Dawn

3) Heroes of the Dawn

4) A Life of Our Own

5) A Journey to Remember

6) Nothing Last Forever

7) Return to Lemuria

Their new album Wanderers is out now

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Second up was Unleash the Archers. Vancouver, Canada based Unleash the Archers was formed in late 2007 by vocalist Brittney Hayes (a.k.a. Brittney Slayes) and drummer Scott Buchanan with former member Brayden Dyczkowski on guitar. Since the bands creation, they have won multiple awards like Best Metal Band 2015 Vancouver Whammy Awards and Best Vocalist 2015 Vancouver Whammy Awards.

If you have ever been lucky enough to attend an Unleash the Archers show you will know these guys have no problem getting the crowd going. As soon as they started with the song Awakening from their 2017 album Apex, not even a minute into it, the crowd had already formed a mosh pit and was going at it.

Unleash the Archers opened with two songs of their 2017 Apex album (Awakening then The Matriarch) followed by Soulbound. The highlight of their performance for me was when they performed Apex and my all time favorite Tonight We Ride from their 2015 album Time Stands Still.The energy Brittney Slayes (Vocalist) and the rest of the gang bring to stage is incredible and quickly spreads towards any crowd to who they perform to. Their new album will be coming out sometime this year, follow them on Facebook to know when the album gets release.

Unleash the Archers are:

Brittney Slayes – Vocals

Scott Buchanan – Drums

Grant Truesdell – Guitar, Vocals

Andrew Kingsley – Guitar, Vocals

Set list of songs played at Regency Ballroom in San Francisco 3-8-2020

1) Awakening

2) The Matriarch

3) Soulbound

4) Northwest Passage

5) Ten Thousand Against One

6) Tonight We Ride

7) Apex

Now it was time for the UK extreme power metal band DRAGONFORCE. Founded in 1999 Grammy-nominated extreme power metal band DRAGONFORCE is based in London, England. Their platinum-selling record, Through the Fire and Flames, brought them international acclaim and was featured as the most-challenging song on Guitar Hero II Their energetic and humorous live performances have won them fans on every continent. These guys did not hold back with their stage props, they had two giant arcade machines (one on each side of the stage) and some really killer looking neon rave glasses with lights on them.

From the get-go in the first song Highway to Oblivion they blasted out confetti’s out of cannons towards the crowd which was very awesome and got the crowd fired up. on their second song “Fury of the Storm” they shot up the Co2 cannons and by the third song , vocalist Marc Hudson came out with a handheld cannon Co2 Cryo Gun and shot towards the crowd.

Unfortunately during the 5th or 6th song they had some technical issues and kept losing power on the stage, the band members were real professional about it and did the best they could to keep the crowd entertained with great constant back and forth interaction, at one point we had Herman Li (guitarist) doing some stand up comedy. The crowd really seemed to not mind the technical issues as they understood sometimes shit happens and they were getting a very unique out of the ordinary show.

Once the crew had fixed the technical issues, DRAGONFORCE continue the show as nothing had happen and played the rest of their set.

To sum it all up these guys was a lot of fun to see on stage, everyone had a blast even when Dragonforce was not playing music and was just standing on the stage drinking beer and going back and forth with the crowd cracking jokes. At one point near the end of their performance they sang a cover of Celine Dion My Heart Will Go On which you all know from the Titanic movie. But the highlight of the night was when guitarist Sam Totman, let a guy in the crowd borrow his guitar, next thing you know they started performing Crazy Train ( Ozzy Ozbourne) , Aquiles Priester (DRAGONFORCE touring drummer) nailed it on the drums while Sam Totman karaoke style the shit out of it! Their new album Extreme Power Metal is out now!

Dragonforce is:

Herman Li – guitar

Sam Totman – guitar

Marc Hudson – vocals

Gee Anzalone – drums

Alicia Vigil (touring bassist)

Aquiles Priester (touring drummer)

Set list of songs played at Regency Ballroom in San Francisco 3-8-2020

1) Highway to Oblivion

2) Fury of the Storm

3) The Last Dragonborn

4) Ashes of the Dawn