The Arena, Brisbane, Australia, 12 May 2005

A ticket for tonight’s show was not just admission to “just another metal gig". No. It was much more than that. It was also a ticket for a seat inside a time machine that would magically transport us all back to 1990. Judging by the crowd tonight, many of them were of the older metal generation that probably remember the dates when Anthrax’s State Of Euphoria and Mortal Sin’s Face Of Despair were both released. Tonight however was special. Not only is Anthrax’s “classic line-up reunion tour” a mark of celebration for the 20 year point in their career, it also marks the return of our own Mortal Sin to the live touring arena once more. Simon Milburn dusted off the High Tops and classic the Injun cap and headed along to the show.

Around 600 or so of the faithful saw Mortal Sin hit the stage around 9pm to a reasonable reception but it was only when long time vocalist Mat Maurer hit the stage did the crowd really show a decent response. Although Anthrax’s set focussed purely on material pre-1993, Mortal Sin were offering up something different by opening with a new track titled My Nightmare. It was the first of six new tracks tonight which were mostly not indicative of the Mortal Sin of old. Tracks such as Out Of The Darkness and Dead Man Walking had some good hooks in them and Maurer’s vocals were instantly recognisable. They were still heavy but gone was much of the pace that the Mortals had utilised before. After opening with two new songs, the first of the old faves to fall upon our ears was the classic Voyage Of The Disturbed (from Face Of Despair), which was written about the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster that occurred in 1986. It still sounded great, and the new line-up of Mick Sultana (guitars, ex-Addictive), Nathan Shea (guitars, ex-Vengeance) and Luke Cook (drums, ex-Vengeance) along with Maurer and original bassist Andy Eftichiou, the Mortals still nailed it as well as Terminal Reward from the same album.

The mixture of new and old material received cheers between songs, but sadly, the new material left the audience appearing lifeless which I expect is due more to it being unfamiliar to them more so than anything else. There was little doubt that the aforementioned Face Of Despair tracks and the closers Lebanon (from Mayhemic Destruction), I Am Immortal (from Face Of Despair) and the title track from Mayhemic Destruction all left their mark and a warm fuzzy type feeling of nostalgia amongst the crowd which was slowly increasing in size throughout the set. Mortal Sin left the stage after their 55 minute set as the punters chanted their name.

It wasn’t long until the chants of Anthrax and “Not” were appearing in unison amongst the crowd. After a time machine ride that flip flopped between now and 1986 with Mortal Sin, when Anthrax took the stage, you knew we were never going to go past 1992. Whilst guitarist Dan Spitz doesn’t have the long hair of the days or old or the classic Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Jackson V guitar and both bassist Frankie Bello and drummer Charlie Benante (who is also Bello’s Uncle) are sporting shorter “do’s” as well, you’d swear it was the 1980s thrash era once more as vocalist Joey Belladonna was proudly sporting the half mic stand. It really doesn’t get any more metal than that, does it?

For 90 minutes, this classic line-up treated us to a fair helping of all the albums of that era – 1984’s Fistful Of Metal, 1985’s Spreading The Disease, 1987’s Among The Living, 1988’s State Of Euphoria and 1990’s Persistence Of Time. The almost 800 strong crowd were loving every minute of this retro revival night. Spitz was nailing solos left, right and centre. Belladonna’s voice was in fine form throughout the evening although there were a couple of times during Medusa that his voice struggled. The return of Bello’s antics and bass tones were very welcomed as an integral part of the Anthrax live performance regardless of your preference for John Bush (vocals) or Belladonna. All the classics that are still a part of the set list today such as Got The Time, Antisocial and Caught In A Mosh were there as well as early thrashers Deathrider and Metal Thrashing Mad.

There were only two niggly points for me. First, the lack of Indian headdress during Indians, which was substituted to a degree by Belladonna sporting a Chicago Blackhawks ice hockey jersey which features a Blackhawk Indian as it’s logo. Second, during I’m The Man, there was no swapping of instruments (Joey on drums and Charlie on the half mic) or some of the crudity that we’ve seen back in the day. These are minor points like I said, but had they been executed they would have simply made an excellent show ever better. Regardless of where your allegiances lie to either Bush or Belladonna, any concerns that fans or critics may have had with Joey’s voice or Dan’s guitar skills or whatever else since this tour was announced officially on April Fool’s Day this year, can be truly laid to rest. This is a tour to celebrate the 20 year mark of their career. What a way to celebrate with a killer show like this?