Witchskull, Pilots of Baalbek, and Robot God, live at the Crow Bar.

It's Friday the 1st of September, just finished work, whadyagunnado?

Go and see a few kickass bands play at a local venue!

In this case, the local venue was long-time Sydney institution The Crow Bar. The three bands on offer this particular Friday night: Robot God, Pilots of Baalbek, and Witchskull

(Pictured left).

As a long-time metal fan who has delved headfirst into the doom metal genre over the last 10 years, coming across Canberran 3-

piece Witchskull a few years ago was an absolute kick to the head. They immediately

became staples on many of my playlists and will continue to be one of my favourite bands of all time. What I wasn’t ready for was the support acts this chilly Friday night.

Up first was the Sydney band Robot God. I had never heard of them until I saw they were playing as support to Witchskull as part of their latest album launch.

Earlier in the week leading up to the gig I thought I'd give Robot God a listen to see what I was in for. They have 2 albums out and went through all of them while doing some work and other activities. With a dark doomy fuzz, I was digging their sound and groove immediately with heavy bass lines and far-out guitar licking my ears through my headset. Shut up and take my money! I was sold. Their sound reminded me of other bands like Elder, Red Fang, Stoned Jesus, and Somali Yacht Club.

However, I was not prepared for how absolutely amazing Robot God would be live. And L O U D. Good lord they were loud. It wasn’t that I couldn’t hear the Raff Iacurtos guitar chords clearly or Tim Pritchards fantastic drum work, even Matt Allen was throwing down more bass lines than Seinfeld intro, but everything was turned up to 11!

I was unquestionably blown away at such (Robot God)

bass-heavy riffs with the blending of the drums and guitar work on their 3 opening tracks. This was an all-out assault on the senses and I could feel the music assaulting my senses and rocking my core. It was quite euphoric and I haven’t even had a drink yet!

Somewhere in the middle Robot God played a song called “Silver Buddha Dreaming” with Matt Allen providing vocals to this haunting track. I found myself singing along while simultaneously banging my head and moving about.

Robot God has come at me from nowhere and are now somewhere near the top of my all-time favourite bands.

I managed to run into Raff coming out of the bathroom (sorry!), shook his hand, and had to tell him how much I enjoyed their set and I intend to follow them as closely as possible.

After a short intermission, and drink to bring me back down to earth, it was time to check out Pilots of Baalbek!

Again I'd given Pilots of Baalbek a listen earlier in the week and it felt like I was transported back to the early to mid-70s hard rock scene with bands like MC5, Deep Purple, Steppenwolf, a lot of AC/DC sound, with a bit of Black Sabbath when Dio was

the vocalist. It was all bell bottoms, flower (Pilots of Baalbek) power, and long hair.

Hailing from Canberra and consisting of Adam Agius on lead guitar and vocals, Mel Walker on second guitar, Dummer Lachlan Paine, and bassist Leah Molluson, Pilots of Baalbek came to rock out and rock out hard!

From start to finish it was non-stop riffing guitars, smashing drums, and full-on 70s hard rock sounds.

Agius, ever the showman, had the crowd captivated with his impressive guitar work and vocal stylings as they went through their set list at a frenetic pace.

Given the talent of musicians and some of the bands they previously played in, it is surprising that Pilots of Baalbek have only released 1 album. Based purely on their set list it would sound like they had at least 3 albums to date given the diversity of sounds and genres they seemed to cover.

Hopefully, I get to see more of them in the future to appreciate more of the hard-rocking 70s vibe Pilots of Baalbek have on display.

After another short break to gather myself, and find another drink, it was time for the headliners Witchskull!

I won't lie, I am an unabashed Witchskull fan. They are a very heavy doomy trio with aggressive riffage and occult lyrical leanings. I discovered Witchskull on Spotify what must be 5 years ago and got to see them for the first time back in February of this year (2023) and I was at a loss for words at how much I enjoyed that gig at the Lansdown.

So you can imagine my excitement when I learned they would be back in town at the Crow Bar for the latest album release ‘The Serpent Tide’.

This latest album debuted at number 5 in the Doom Metal chart garnering the Canberra band a much larger and international audience. This is nothing to be sniffed at either, coming in higher in the Doom Charts than much more well-known bands like King Gizzard and Queens of The Stone Age.

I listened to the album well in advance of the show (many many times…) and was sure as hell looking forward to seeing them again.

Playing several tracks of their latest album as well as some of their previous work, it was hard not to be stomping to ‘The Serving Ritual’, to then be head banging along with ‘Tyrian Dawn’, and then shout into the void with ‘Raven’ from their 2nd album.

There is just something about seeing Marcus De Pasquale's full power stance, leaning hard into the mic and yarling away, only to straighten up and face Tony McMahon on bass and just shred with Drummer Joel Green in the background just smashing the kit to pieces.

Witchskull, Pilots of Baalbek, and Robot God was an insanely blasting show that will live rent-free in my head for years to come as try to chase that high of these 3 simply unbelievable bands.

It was a sea of long hair, beards, dad bods, and black jeans mixed together like some sort of doom metal vortex. It was a hot, sweaty, head-banging, stomping, thrashing, grooving, and ludicrous gig that will live on in my (WitchSkull)

memories for years. And LOUD. So loud. One day soon my ears will stop ringing and I'll be reminded of that night that I hope to relive as soon as possible.

Listen Here -

WitchSkull

Pilots of Baalbek

Robot God