Nails
Support: Toxic Holocaust, Gatecreeper, Six of Swords
Date: Saturday March 25th, 2017
Venue: Lee's Palace in Toronto, Ontario
T-shirt worn: Revenge "Behold.Total.Rejection."

A band called Six of Swords was added to the show at the last minute. They may or may not have been local and I came in during their last song. Lee's Palace was already uncomfortably packed.

The first touring band was some band called Gatecreeper. They were pretty much a death metal band and they weren't that bad. But I had to move to the back of the venue like two minutes into their set because it was so uncomfortably hot closer to the stage. They played seven or eight or nine songs.

Toxic Holocaust is a name I haven't heard in quite some time. I saw them a couple times in 2008/2009 but haven't head of then since and I thought they'd called it a day. The only member I've ever seen at all the shows I've them at is (main guy) Joel Grind and I don't know why but it made me giggle that he's playing bass on this tour. I don’t know why I found that funny but I commend him for soldiering on after all these years. They were fine. Their best two songs were their first two songs. I liked them a lot more ten years ago but I've seen a lot of bands since then.

Toxic Holocaust
1. War is Hell
2. Wild Dogs
3. In the Name of Science
4. Gravelord
5. ?
6. The Lord of the Wasteland
7. Silence
8. Nuke the Cross
9. Bitch

So I saw Nails this past June (2016) and wasn't very impressed. The sound was shit and Todd's vocals were toast. So, would a better and bigger venue this time around and a hiatus make a difference? Yeah, it did. I was able to make out things a lot better despite being at the back of the venue. I even noticed a lot of the paint from the ceiling falling off during their set. They still have the same guy from the last tour doing second guitar so he may or may not be a full member of the band now? The highlight was the first run of seven songs because it was a non-stop barrage of noise. If anything’s changed for the negative it’s that they’re “rock stars” now. Todd did the whole “we’ve been to Boston, Montreal, New York on this tour BUT TORONTO HAS BEEN THE BEST SHOW”-shtick. He spoke to the crowd a lot more too. But the levels during those parts were terrible and I couldn’t hear a word he said. Maybe he was having an off night when I saw them the last time? They even were supposed to do an encore break but eschewed it. The crowd has changed a lot since June too though. There were a lot of Pantera shirts. So they’re huge now. I don’t know if they’re “Opera House” huge yet (which is the next step up in venue size in Toronto as far as I know) but I wouldn’t be surprised to see them jumping on a tour as an opening act for a bigger band like Lamb of God or whoever else the kids like these days next.

Nails
1. Savage Intolerance
2. You Will Never Be One of Us
3. Friend to All
4. Conform
5. Scum Will Rise
6. Gods Cold Hands
7. Tyrant
8. Life is a Death Sentence
9. Made to Make You Fail
10. Wide Open Wound
11. I Will Not Follow
12. Violence is Forever
13. Suffering Soul
14. In Pain
15. Sick Boy (GBH cover)
16. They Come Crawling Back
17. Parasite
18. Scapegoat
19. Unsilent Death