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DEAN BIRKHEIMER | Go Venue Magazine

Since its opening, The Steelhouse has quickly become a cultural hub in Omaha’s downtown, hosting major concerts (its first was The Killers), community programming, and local artist showcases. It not only enriches the city’s arts scene but also contributes to downtown revitalization and draws fans from across the region.

Friday the 13th has a reputation for broken mirrors, black cats, and ladders you shouldn’t walk under, but on Friday the 13th at The Steelhouse in Omaha Nebraska, the only bad luck in the room was for the ones who missed out on a night of punk rock mischief.  The co-headlining tour with the Descendents and Frank Turner and The Sleeping Souls slashed its way into Omaha like a Friday the 13th nightmare.  Instead of terror, the crowd found loud, sweaty redemption.

The evening kicked off with NOBRO, who burst onto the stage like someone knocking over a salt shaker and daring fate to do something about it. Their set was raw, chaotic, and joyfully reckless, exactly the kind of energy you want to start a show. With snarling guitars and punchy hooks, they whipped the early crowd into motion fast. If anyone had walked into Steelhouse believing in bad omens, NOBRO stomped them flat before the first set was over.  

Frank Turner with show 3132 followed, bringing the kind of heart-on-his-sleeve cleansing that feels like the musical equivalent of finding a four-leaf clover. Backed by his band, The Sleeping Souls, Turner turned the Steelhouse into a singalong sanctuary. Songs bounced between fist-pumping punk and reflective folk-punk admissions. The crowd responded like they’d been granted immunity from the night’s supposed voodoo. When Turner asked the audience to jump, the floor moved like the whole building had stepped on a crack and decided to break gravity instead of anyone’s mother’s back. His mix of humor, storytelling, and full-throttle energy felt like a good luck charm hanging over the room. At one point he asked the crowd to sing lyrics and during a practice run, he comically ridiculed the fans effort. This got everyone fired up and during the actual song, the audience blew the roof off the building. A wonderful moment occurred when the band left the stage and Frank was alone with an acoustic guitar, he was accompanied by a single spotlight and hit the crowd with “Be More Kind” and “The Ballad”. He and the Souls finished with “Four Simple Words”.  My Four words….A Masterclass of Showmanship

By the time the Descendents took the stage, any lingering superstition had long since been exorcised. The band ripped into their set with the efficiency of a lightning strike. They were fast, sharp, and impossible to ignore. Milo Aukerman’s unmistakable voice echoed through the room while the band blasted through decades of punk staples with zero sign of slowing down. The pit moved like a possessed roulette wheel that seemed to never stop spinning, conjuring thoughts of Alfred Hitchcocks movie “Vertigo”. Frontman Milo Aukerman still exudes that signature mix of geeky charm and punk defiance, effortlessly commanding the audience while singing classics like “Suburban Home” and “Hope.”   The rhythm section was tight and relentless. Bill Stevenson drove the songs with precision, while Karl Alvarez kept the groove punchy and energetic, giving each song a propulsive backbone. Guitarist Stephen Egerton shredded with that raw, melodic edge the band is known for, blending speed with clarity in a way that only veteran musicians can pull off. There was a moment when the bands technician, Rhino was brought out so the crowd could sing happy birthday to him.

The Steelhouse felt like a gathering of people who had decided to tempt fate together, and won. Ladders might have been avoided on the way in, but inside the venue the only thing people were climbing was the surge of energy from the stage. Black cats could have crossed every street outside and it wouldn’t have mattered. Friday the 13th may be famous for misfortune, but in Omaha it turned out to be the perfect night for musical chaos and proof that sometimes the best way to deal with bad luck is to turn the amps up loud enough that fate can’t hear itself think. After the bands encore the throngs of fans left all smiles and feeling lucky to have seen such a great show.

Descendents

Frank Turner

NOBRO

[See image gallery at www.govenuemagazine.com] All images © Dean Birkheimer

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The post Milo Goes to Omaha: Friday the 13th was not unlucky as The Descendents and Frank Turner and The Sleeping Souls with NOBRO Crashed into The Steelhouse appeared first on Go Venue Magazine.

Album Review: Exodus – Goliath

Reviewed by Gareth Pugh

Let’s face facts, Exodus is as metal as it comes, co-founders of the thrash scene, together with Metallica, Dave Mustaine and over on the East Coast Overkill and Anthrax, and it’s extraordinary to think that over forty years have passed since ‘Bonded by Blood’ was released. Now they are about to release album number thirteen, with a new, yet familiar face up front, the return of Rob Dukes to the role of vocalist after the second and what looks to be the final departure of Steve “Zetro” Souza.

Now, I can’t say with any conviction, I’ve ever been the biggest fan of Rob Dukes’ vocals, and I consider him to be the least effective of the three vocalists they have had, with less charisma than either of his predecessors: Baloff or Zetro. However, I am pleased to say his performance on ‘Goliath’ is easily his best on an Exodus album so far, his usual aggression is tempered with more melody and even subtlety to give a more varied, nuanced and powerful performance.

Starting with a minute long ominous skin crawling intro ‘3111’ then plunges into all out thrash barrage with what could only be an archetypal Exodus riff, while Dukes spits out the uncomfortable lyrics, the song is about the narco killings in Juarez, and the title is the estimated number of murders for 2010 alone, bleak stuff! “Hostis Humani Generis” (enemy of mankind) is no shrinking violet either, riffs spewing left and right with no let-up in pace.

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The first two tracks could easily have come from any Exodus album and ease you into the fray with no shocks in earshot, but for the next three tracks the band mix things up somewhat, ‘The Changing Me’ is more mid-paced, but it’s the chorus with Peter Tägtgren’s clean vocals mixing with Rob’s more vicious delivery that catches you off guard with its jarring ‘against the grain’ timing. ‘Promise You This’ has a bit of a southern rock groove to it, but with a contemporary feel, and the chorus is extremely catchy, honestly it will be stuck in your head for days.

The title-track is another more experimental song, the band has dabbled with slower tempos previously, for example ‘Prescribing Horror’ from the last album, but this slows things down to a menacing crawl, with Jack Gibsons bass providing a pulverising low end, and the guitars a doom like sludge, the chorus lifts the despair with some serpentine leads before an astonishing mid-section with guest strings from Katie Jacoby, a surprise all around and a real grower. ‘Beyond The Event Horizon’ brings things back to normal as it picks up the pace with a more conventional structure, while ‘2 Minute Hate’ is another one with a bluesy swagger to it with plenty of groove, yet still has plenty of attack.

‘Summon of the God Unknown’ is an 8-minute epic full of crushing chords and fiddly melodies, it takes the listener on a roller-coaster journey and gradually builds pace from brooding menace to a sudden adrenaline rush of pummelling frenzied riffage. Finishing the album on a real thrash high note is ‘The Dirtiest Of The Dozen’ which reminds me of ‘Tempo of the Damned’ title track with a punchy chorus and more piledriving riffs.

This is easily the most varied Exodus album to date and hats off to them for their bravery at this stage of their career. Is it perfect, hell no some of the songs still could do with some trimming of the fat shall we say, but on the whole, this is a damn fine album, and possibly their most consistent for a decade or more. On this evidence there’s still plenty of ‘good friendly violent fun’ for everyone for many more years to come.

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Born Ronald Wycherley in April 1940, Billy Fury studied piano before his teenage years and had his first guitar by age 14. In 1955, he fronted his own group while also working full-time on a tugboat and later as a docker. A talent contest victory helped push him further toward music, and by 1958, he was writing his own songs. That same year, he went to the Essoldo Theatre in Birkenhead, hoping manager Larry Parnes might pass along some of his compositions to Marty Wilde, but the meeting changed his life when Parnes put him onstage instead, signed him, added

The post Top 10 Billy Fury Songs appeared first on ClassicRockHistory.com.

Frontiers Music [Release date : 20.03.26] Judge a hot band by the company they keep. Ignescent have opened for Flyleaf, Skillet, Stryper and many other headline metal/hard rock acts in recent years. You could hear the influences of these bands … Continue reading →

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Crimson Glory recently announced their brand new album ‘Chasing The Hydra‘, the first new album in 26 years. The album will be released worldwide on all digital services, CD and vinyl on April 17th via BraveWords Records. The early reviews have been incredible and the band have just released a new track to YouTube for […]

The post Crimson Glory Release ‘Angel In My Nightmare’ appeared first on ROCKPOSER DOT COM!.

House Of All: Inklings (Tiny Global Productions) Released 20 March 2026 CD | Vinyl | DL | Streaming ALBUM OF THE WEEK! Post-Fall giants House Of All return with their fourth album in four years. Inklings builds on the band’s singular mythology while delivering some gripping music. Robert Plummer follows the valiant heart. House Of […]

The post House Of All: Inklings – Album Review appeared first on Louder Than War.

Less than two years removed from Winter Eternal’s last album, the Greek transplant (now based in Scotland) returns with fifth LP Unveiled Nightsky. Those familiar with Winter Eternal will quickly recognize their frosty guile, as mastermind Soulreaper retains the outfit’s meloblack core and tinkers with the band’s style by inches rather than miles.¹ For anyone unacquainted with Winter Eternal, Dissection, Thucandra, and Ancient supply a primer for what to expect. Melodic black metal can be a tricky genre, and though bands like Dissection and Old Man’s Child garner widespread appreciation, many others stumble as they walk the tightrope between trveness and tunefulness. So where does Winter Eternal fit in, and is Unveiled Nightsky a panorama worth staying up late for?

Since releasing their self-titled debut in 2013, Winter Eternal’s quality has soared and dipped across five albums. In his review of 2021’s Land of Darkness, El Cuervo asserted that Winter Eternal’s sophomore outing Realm of the Bleeding Shadows was one of the 2010s top meloblack albums, though Land of Darkness made for a mixed experience due to a questionable mix and a clunky blend of black metal with trad tropes. 2024’s outing Echoes of Primordial Gnosis went unreviewed in our halls, but my opinion is that Soulreaper corrected the production issues and better merged the underlying styles. Still, while Echoes starts strong, the last triptych of tracks blurs together in an underwhelming finale. Winter Eternal’s trend up to this point proves a clear and direct correlation between the duration between releases and the quality of an ensuing platter. While most of us accept that correlation doesn’t equal causation, Unveiled Nightsky nonetheless falls victim to the aforementioned paradigm.

Winter Eternal consistently showcases wonderful potential, but hasn’t yet recaptured the triumph of 2019’s Realm of the Bleeding Shadows. Where previous albums bristle with six-string creativity and thoughtful riffcraft, too often Unveiled Nightsky relies on rote trem-picks. There are guitar heroics that gleam, such as the magnificent hooks on “Omen of the Cosmic Order,” the intro to “Descent in Hades Embrace,” and the entirety of closer “Drifting into the Depths of Oblivion,” with the acoustic bits harkening to Dissection’s Storm of the Light’s Bane especially. Still, the majority of Unveiled Nightsky’s guitar work leaves me unfulfilled. Similarly, the vocals on Unveiled Nightsky are competent but lack urgency and volatility, imbuing a uniformity that remains serviceable yet unexciting.

Despite these complaints, Winter Eternal evinces plenty of tricks proving that promise thrums beneath Nightsky’s surface. Though Soulreaper has always locked in low-end grooves, the bass on Unveiled Nightsky bounces and bedazzles with a vivacity that’s rare in black metal. The sullen intro to “Echoes of a Fallen Crown” and the sultry purr in “Nurtured by the Night” are but tastes of the bass’s perfectly integrated role in Winter Eternal’s soundscape. Interestingly, my experience has been that one-man projects often boast a well-utilized bass, crafting engaging countermelodies that offset what the rest of the parts are doing. Besides guitars, bass, and vocals,² Soulreaper enlists drummer V. Felonis to man the kit, and the marvelous production makes it easy to appreciate the rhythm section on Unveiled Nightsky. This acts as a well-considered and well-executed feat, especially given Cuervo’s complaint about Land of Darkness. All told, there are plenty of good decisions that help offset the critiques listed above.

In total, Unveiled Nightsky presents a textbook Mixed experience. Winter Eternal supplies evidence abutting both sides of the score, serving up sharp songwriting hamstrung by too many moments that feel sterile and imply derring-do more than achieve it. For the curious, I encourage listeners to give this a spin and make up their own mind. I believe what you’ll find is a half-hour of fun and groovy meloblack that satisfies as a snack, but lacks the sizzle and substance required for a metal-heavy diet. As an avid fan of meloblack, I look forward to what Winter Eternal Unveils next, and hope Soulreaper takes whatever time necessary to gift us the Eternal classic I know he’s capable of.

Rating: Mixed
DR: 8 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Hells Headbangers
Websites: Bandcamp | Facebook
Releases Worldwide: February 13th, 2026

The post Winter Eternal – Unveiled Nightsky Review appeared first on Angry Metal Guy.