Ask many musicians who pick up a guitar, bang the drums or belt out vocals to their heart’s content why they do so, and they’ll tell you they have one thing in mind: making it big someday.
For 10 bands from the Lone Star State, the vision of living large for at least one day emanated Saturday night at a quaint San Antonio bar known as Fitzgerald’s. And two of those artists kept that mindset alive for another month by traveling from afar in vastly different ways.
Texas Voodoo Stomp and Valkyrie, the last two groups to perform, made the biggest impression on the three-judge panel to advance from the San Antonio Regional of the second annual Wacken Metal Battle. With artists from across the nation vying to become the sole band representing the United States among winners from 29 other nations at the world’s largest annual metal festival — Wacken Open Air from July 30-Aug. 1 in Germany among headliners Judas Priest, Slipknot and Amon Amarth — Texas Voodoo Stomp and Valkryie stood out the most. As such, they earned a berth in the state final Saturday, March 14, at Come and Take It Live in Austin.
Their chances to advance further increase because the competition dwindles with each round. The opposition in Austin will be Houston Regional winners Scrap Pile and Of The Fallen plus Austin Regional victors Hanna Barakat and Gran Andes. The victor of the state final advances to the national round May 9 at The Viper Room in Los Angeles, with that winner advancing to Deutschland.
Texas Voodoo Stomp and Valkryie’s paths covered a wide swath of terrain — literally and figuratively.
The former quintet, easily the loudest of the 10 bands at Fitzgerald’s, made the 800-plus mile trek from El Paso just to play a 20-minute set. It paid off with the help of the most vocal and largest contingent of crowd support that put to shame those who turned out — or didn’t — for the hometown groups. Click here to watch ATM Facebook Live footage of Texas Voodoo Stomp performing “Killing Time” and “Resurrect Me” plus the clip below of “The Walking Dead.”
The latter, San Antonio’s Valkyrie, easily qualified as the sentimental favorite among judges Brian Keith (The Edge Rock Radio), Jacob Sendejo (KYSM-FM DJ) and Herb Rockman (Herb’s Hut Record Store). High-pitched vocalist Joe Gregory and guitarist Scott Stine hadn’t played on stage in 33 years but took a leap of faith by reuniting for the chance to possibly perform at Wacken. They re-recorded some of their classics for an EP last month after having recruited bassist Al Kelly and drummer Rich Gomez, both of local group Under No One, a little more than a year ago. Lo and behold, the quartet pulled a rabbit out of its hat and, along with Texas Voodoo Stomp, had just enough to edge third-place Cauterized. Watch Valkyrie in action on “Valkyre” and “Screams of the Aggressor.”
With each band having to adjust to a mere 20-minute set and playing in alphabetical order, time was of the essence to make an impression. While being graded on categories such as originality, energy, image and musicianship, each group was challenged to come across as the band that would rock the judges’ socks off. Instead, some fell into the trap of treating it like another Saturday night at Fitzgerald’s of playing to friends and family rather than performing as if their lives depended on it and envisioning themselves in front of 80,000 German maniacs — as 2019 national winners, San Diego thrashers Monarch, ended up doing here.
Gregory, in fact, was the only musician of the 10 artists to even mention Wacken (as viewed in Valkyrie’s aforementioned ATM clip). That reference undoubtedly earned his band extra points that helped put it over the top. Other groups, while shining in their own way musically, may have lost out by plugging their merch and social media pages — things that can be done any day of the week but shouldn’t have been wasted with only 20 minutes allotted and considering what was at stake. Other than the victorious bands, the musician who appeared to understand the importance of laying it all on the line and playing to the judges and crowd with the utmost passion and energy the most was vocalist Alex Carabajal of Cauterized (see 46-photo slideshow below). His local band’s efforts nearly put it in the final two, with only half a point separating Cauterized from a trip to Austin.
That fact exemplified the stiff competition as the bands brought various styles from all over the state to Fitzgerald’s. Click the links to watch ATM Facebook Live footage of them in action. The San Antonio contingent included Aeternal Requiem, which kicked off the night at 6:30 p.m., then had to wait six hours for the results, Beauty School Massacre, Bridge 13, Cauterized, Send Help and Syrus, which played in Germany two years ago at Headbangers Open Air.
Industrial act Akardia also made the long haul from El Paso with its Rammstein influence ever apparent. TBA TX Noise, a Corpus Christi band partially abbreviated as Tits, Beer and Ass, reminded one of early ‘90s comical band Scatterbrain (minus the pajamas and pigtails).
See more exclusive ATM footage of the groups below from the regional that was supposed to consist of 15 bands only to have Black Jackal, Burning Circle, Pigweed, Saving Jackie and Semper Acerbus withdraw.
Purchase tickets for the March 14 state final in Austin here. May the best band go to Hollywood. And possibly to Germany.
