Review By Erwin Van Dijk - Date Of The Event : 26.05.2009

 

This gig was the album presentation for "The Flame Within"  (read the review here), the second album of the band and the first one with the post Arjen Lucassen line up.

Ayreon mastermind Arjen Lucassen has besides a lot of talent a good eye (or ear) for talented female singers. Think of Simone Simons, Lana Lane, Anneke van Giersbergen, Marjan Wellman and Sharon den Adel.

When female fronted bands became big business in Europe he must have thought: "I can do that better!". The result was Stream of Passion.

The other half of the Stream of Passion core was Marcela Bovio from Mexico. Europe and South America have always had similar tastes when it comes to Metal (or Mexican food). For example, many bands from Holland do good business in Latin America. The Gathering was the first, followed by After Forever and Epica while currently God Dethroned and Elexorien are preparing for an invasion this autumn.

This also shows the fundamental difference between the USA and the rest of the world. Melissa Ferlaak (Aesma Daeva / Visions of Atlantis) once said to me in an interview :

“The US (for Mexico, South America and Canada are more in line with European tastes) is interested in US metal, mainly metal core and nu metal. Radio metal. Europe and the other parts of the Americas are more interested in symphonic, black, interesting metal and music.”

Stream of Passion started more or less with the Ayreon album “The Human Equation” (not my favourite album by the way). Marcela was one of the singers on this album. And she did a good job. Maybe is was her Mexican heritage but Marcela’s voice has something most European singers do not have. (Not necessary lack) It gives Stream of Passion something you can recognize straight away..

What surprised most people must have been the fact that Stream of Passion worked at all! Arjen Lucassen is notorious for being not a team member. He did quit Vengeance because he did not like the life in a band and more recently we had the Lana Lane debacle with her tour in Japan.

Arjen did some gigs the last nine years, like with his "Star One" project and every album release party is an absolute ‘must see’. But the life in a real band? With Stream of Passion it worked. Mostly because he knew it was temporary. Being a genius he was already working on Ayreon’s next album by the time the "Embrace the Storm" tour had runs its course.

Last year we had a little preview of the new Stream of Passion without Arjen, Lori and Alejandro. I saw two gigs, at Het Kasteel and ‘t Paard and those were very promising.

“The Flame Within” has not turned out to be a carbon copy of "Embrace The Storm" and that is a good thing.

Back to the release party. It was almost one month delayed due to various reasons. The venue is a part of the Tivoli organisation in Utrecht. The main hall ‘Oudegracht’ is in the old city centre while ‘De Helling’ is outside the medieval city walls and under the shadow of a police station of all places! This hall is much more modern than the shabby old building of the Oudegracht. For a Friday gig it started quite early, around 19:00. So most people were still stuck in the traffic.

 

 

 

Like Stream of Passion opener theNAME had also drum troubles. The old drummer left after theNAME had to cancel some gigs as opener for Kamelot in Spain. There might be a connection between those two events but there is nothing official. They brought back a temporary replacement, Ronald, who used to be their drummer ages ago before I knew theNAME existed. By now they are almost the house band of the Tivoli. This is third time since 2007. The first gig was with Epica and Kryperia during the Summer Darkness festival and the second one with a very boring Xandria, some gothic band from Germany.

The downside of the Tivoli are the drinks they serve here. I hate Pepsi and local beer band Dommelsch even more. It is better to spend evening on bottled water from Belgium and grap some good drinks at the Stairway pub.

The last theNAME gig was during "The disaster at Uithoorn" night. The two main acts of that night, theNAME and Sin7sinS did some great performances that night but the venue itself turned out to be a dark hellhole.

Because theNAME and Stream of Passion make different kinds of metal it took a few songs before the audience was warmed up. And even then it was clear that most of the audience was here for the headliner. In Holland we call this “ondankbaar werk” Unrewarding work so to say. The fact that most people arrived after theName did not help either to create a good vibe.

But they did a good job in front of a difficult audience and at a very early time.

TheNAME has released three new songs on MySpace as teaser for upcoming album: "Enchained", "No retractation", "One" (no connection with Metallica I hope).

 

 

 At the worst possible moment Davey Mickers decided to leave the band. If you look at Stream of Passions tour scheme you might guess why. If I would get a taco or quesadilla every time I could see SOP this summer I would become as fat as Fat Bastard from the Austin Powers franchise. Among the many gigs is a show at the prestigious Metal Female Voices Fest. Another reason to visit De Oktoberhallen this year.

 With the new incarnation of Stream of Passion Marcela is the centre of the show. And the most important difference is the background singer. The old Stream of Passion had Marcela’s sister Diana as singer. Diana was more visible on stage, especially with duets where she would actually left her spot. Replacement Lucy Legaspi is literary a background singer. You would barely notice her. I always liked the duets between Marcela and Diana so this is something I really miss.

This brings me to Eric Hazebroek. Some people might know him from his former band Trisomy. Thank goth Stream of Passion is much better band than Trisomy which is a dark chapter in the history of music of the Low Countries. His style of guitar playing fits much better in Stream of Passion than in his former band. Compared to him Stephan Schultz (the lead guitarist) stays a bit in the background while old timer Johan van Stratum still has his dreadlocks and a nice dress onstage ;) Martijn Peters, the new drummer, did a good job. Together with keyboarder Jeffrey Revet they are the invisible men who keep the machine running.

The highlights of the Stream of Passion set were "Out in the real world" and "When you hurt me the most". Sadly “Out in the real world” is the song they use to introduce the band. There are many things I would like to experience in my live. Like “Radar Love” from The Golden Earring performed live without those Goth awful solos ruining the song. And “Out of the real world” without all that talk.

Just play and rock!

Despite this the new Stream of Passion album is far better than anything Delain has to offer right now. They are much more sympathic than Delain – the nearest competitor these days. Delain always trying to be bigger than they really are. Good but still not the best in this genre.

And it was of course celebrities spotting time: The Man Arjen himself and Maaike & Daan Janzing from Kingfisher Sky among the many visitors in an overcrowded venue.

I had a little discussion with Maaike from Kingfisher about Yamaha’s line of classic instruments. While the violins are not so bad – see Marcela’s instrument - the electric cellos are plain ugly. You can better invest your money in an Draco from Bridge Instruments. Speaking of Marcela’s violin. Unlike with other bands this instrument replaces some of Marcela’s vocal lines. It gives Stream of Passion something unique.

And although this is not a fashion review I must admit that Marcela has a much better taste for stage outfits than some other singers. And the feathers reminds me of some Aztec battle dress. It is the same outfits as the one she wears on the cover of “The Flame Within”.

In short: Stream of Passion did a great gig. If you have the change to see them this summer, do not hesitate!

 

Links :

Stream Of Passion Official MySpace

theNAME Official MySpace

Stream Of Passion Official Site

theNAME Official Site

 

Line Up Bands :

Stream Of Passion:

• Marcela Bovio - Lead vocals, Electric Violin
• Johan van Stratum - Bass guitar
• Eric Hazebroek - Guitars
• Stephan Schultz - Guitars
• Jeffrey Revet - Keyboards & Synths
• Martijn Peters - Drums

theNAME :

• Hadassa - Vocals
• Silas - Guitar
• Mike - Bass
• Salvador - Drums