The Joint in Las Vegas hosted a trifecta of metal with the return of Five Finger Death Punch, Volbeat and Hellyeah to Las Vegas. This came as a climatic hometown show for members of FFDP and Hellyeah, with only a couple more shows before the end of the North American tour for this year. Vegas welcomed all three bands with a sold out frenzy of fans in the house, with openers Nothing More warming up the crowd for the three big guns.
Hellyeah came out strong and bloody with namesake song “Hellyeah” and “Sangre por Sangre (Blood for Blood)” from this summers cd release of the same name, with singer Chad Gray blood drenched and menacing with a megaphone as he wove a fiendish scene for the fans from center stage. Hellyeah played a shorter but pounding songlist, with Vegas’ own (at least we claim him part time) Vinnie Paul setting the beat, along with Tom Maxwell on guitar and newer members Kyle Sanders on bass and Chris Brady on guitar to round out the new crew. Hellyeah powered through “Demons in the Dirt”, “War in Me”,”Moth”, Cross to Bier”, and “You Wouldn’t Know” to a mass of fans moshing and screaming along.
Co-headliners Vobeat hit the stage to a massive roar from the fans, and that roar never stopped during their long hour plus set. The Danish metal/punk/rockabilly foursome cranked out hits and showed how versatile and powerful they really are with radio giants “Heaven or Hell” and “A Warriors Call” alongside metal fuzed “The Hangman’s Body Count” and “Dead But Rising”; their signature punkrockabilly sound of “Sad Man’s Tongue” mashupmixed with Johnny Cash’s “Ring of Fire”, alongside country infused “Lonesome Rider”. The front line of fans wove a frenzied mosh pit for the bulk of the Volbeat set, and frontman Michael Poulsen let the crowd take over and sing for entire verses at a time, and they could have kept at it all night, everyone in the Joint seemed to know all the words to every song. Volbeat pulled younger fans onstage for their finale of the night, and kids headbanged alongside the band for “Still Counting”.
(Volbeat Gallery, Courtesy of the The Joint by Wayne Posner for Kabik Photo Group)
The nights final headliner and hometown boys Five Finger Death Punch charged into “Under and Over It” with frontman Ivan Moody sporting a UNLV shirt and yelling at the crowd “it’s good to be home!” It’s been a couple years since the Vegas band has made its way back to play in Sin City, and they made sure the fans got 200%, pounding through “Burn It Down”, “Hard to See” and “Lift Me Up”. Moody kept the audience enthralled and involved, at one point calling out for veterans to raise their hands as he dedicated “Bad Company” sans American Flag to crowd chants of USA! USA! FFDP tore through “Battle Born”,”Remember Everything” and slowed down with “Far From Home” among the many songs on their set, and finished up with a blistering “The Bleeding” after which Moody yelled “I love you Nevada!” before the band exited the stage. For those that stayed on a couple more minutes after the lights came up, FFDP came back on stage for a last run with “House of the Rising Sun” before they ended the night and the perfect ending of a triumphant return to Vegas.
(Five Finger Death Punch Gallery, Courtesy of the The Joint by Wayne Posner for Kabik Photo Group)
