MEESTERLIJK METAAL XXVII

Old School Or No School
It was in the year of steel 2003 that guitarist Martjo “Whirlewolf” Brongers (from legendary Dutch heavy metal act VORTEX) came face to face with the young headbanger Nima “MetalHeart” Sadeghi on the Belgian battleground of Graspop Metal Meeting. The two immediately discovered their common passion for Heavy Metal and Jack Daniel’s… and discovered that both were resident in the city of Groningen, in the north of the Netherlands. A friendship was born and grew stronger over the years. The talks of the two making music together was something that kept coming up for a long time, but the right time and opportunity never seemed to come along.
In 2016 the time was finally there: the talks were over, it was time to take action, and so STEEL SHOCK was born. The mission: unleashing Heavy Metal in the 80s tradition: no trends, no compromise, just pure fucking Heavy Metal and all its glorious clichés.
Having found the right people with the right attitude to complete the force, the forging of steel tunes began to take shape, a deal with the Greek label Alone Records was quickly a fact, and in the spring of 2017 the first demo, ‘First Strike’, was unleashed. Limited to 250 hand-numbered copies the demo was given away for free at the legendary and prestigious Keep It True festival in Germany.
The demo was a huge success and a few journalists took it upon themselves to write about it. The five warriors left no time for argue and completed their debut album, ‘For Metal To Battle’, which was released in September, followed by a successful tour with German warriors, Wizard. The album has received, and is still receiving great reviews from the international press, and the reactions of the fans is overwhelming to say the least.
The Shockers have already started working on material for the second album, which tentatively will be released in the fall/winter of 2018. Of course plans for further live battle are in full preparation as we speak…

VEXATION is een 5-mans metal/rock formatie uit de omgeving Amsterdam. De band is in de jaren ´80 opgericht, en maakt eigen up-tempo/ melodieuze metalnummers met een “muur van geluid”.
Stevig gitaarwerk met prachtige solo’s. VEXATION speelt soms ook wisselend een aantal covers van o.a. Judas Priest, Metallica, Motorhead en meerdere bekende metalbands. Begin jaren ´90 heeft de band een break gehad, en diverse bandleden hebben toen in verschillende bandjes en projecten gespeeld. In 2007 is de band weer in zijn oorspronkelijke bezetting bij elkaar gekomen voor een reunie-gig. Dit beviel zo goed dat de leden besloten de samenwerking voort te zetten. Oude nummers werden aangevuld door nieuw materiaal, en sindsdien is er al regelmatig opgetreden. VEXATION heeft in september 2017 een CD uitgebracht genaamd Dark Fear, die op menig digitaal radiostation te horen is.
VEXATION is:
Benny van den Dam – Drums / management / boekingen
Evert van den Dam – Gitaar
Andrew Wardenaar – Gitaar
Harro Ferwerda – Vocals
Boudewijn Geels – Basgitaar