Showing up to an all-day metal festival just in time for the last few headliners is cheating. With 14+ bands playing each day, it’s almost like these are set up as semi-yearly metal endurance tests. Make it through eight locals and six touring bands and you are rewarded in the end.

So I cheated. I showed up to Emerald City Metal Fest late. As tempting as hanging out and listening to 10 solid hours of blast beats on a dreary Saturday afternoon sounded, one person can only take so many hours of booming amps and cookie monster vocals before it all starts to blend into a twirling headache of audio diarrhea.

That being said, day one's headliner, New York veterans Suffocation held a clinic on how to play uncompromising death metal Saturday night.

“We took an oath to death metal 20 years ago and we will never back down from playing brutal music,” said vocalist Frank Mullen onstage. “I for one can not sing and I'll never be able to fucking sing.”

Much more after the jump...

Truthfully, it’s almost a shame that Suffocation had to headline. As the night dragged on and main support, The Faceless, left the stage, the audience started to thin.

Performing their 2008 concept album Planetary Duality in its entirety for the first time ever, The Faceless brought a blend of progressive rock and death metal, flashy guitar sweeps intertwined with crushing breakdowns.

Fog-machines accented the bands alien-inspired backdrops and the superb Studio Seven sound quality — loud, but not earplugs loud — truly showcased the dynamics throughout their 9-song set.

“This song goes out to a dirty rat bastard that we all know,” said vocalist Jeff Ventimiglia aka Demon Carcass. “It’s called Xenochrist.”

Either way, Suffocation shredded. Led by the riffing of Terrance Hobbs’ BC Rich Warlock (bedazzled with a Suffocation sticker of course) Mullen barked out 40 solid minutes of guttural growls, the only real method of delivery for lyrics about digging up bodies (“Infecting the Crypts”).

Anytime Mullen steps on stage the in-between song banter is sure to be golden.
“This next song is about killing people, because that’s what I like to do,” said Mullen in a monotone pitch that carried more than a bit of sarcasm.

Before launching into “Bind Torture Kill” an especially heavy song from the bands self-titled 2006 album, he went on a two-minute tangent, describing the lengths he would go to if anyone ever “fucked with his daughter.”

“After 30 years of putting in a hard days work torturing you, I’ll retire to the Florida Keys,” Mullen said. “Then the last thing I'm going to do is kill you."

If Saturday night was the metal night, then Sunday was geared toward a more “hardcore” audience. A full-sized tour bus with the “Affliction” logo and a flashing “show us your tits” sign in the front window sat outside Studio Seven, housing Sunday’s headliners Bury Your Dead and Throwdown.

Showing up late (again) and missing Tacoma grind core band Owen Hart was the first major fail of the evening. It would have been at least interesting to see how a band known for playing raging basement shows transfers over to a fest filled with bands performing choreographed stage moves. Crab core, anyone?

In stark contrast to the anti-religious sentiments of day one headliners The Faceless and Suffocation, Mattie Montgomery, vocalist of metal core band For Today, dedicated a song to his fellow Christian “revolutionaries.”

“We’re here to glorify the name of our lord and savior Jesus Christ, “ Montgomery declared. “For too long I was swallowing the lies of the MTV culture that surrounds us and then Jesus said one word to me and saved my life. “

As he paused for a breath, applause filled the room. One woman screamed from the back of the room, “I don’t want to hear this Christian bullshit!”

Montgomery continued.

“I want to speak out and say that everyone has a destiny that’s bigger than what’s in this room.”

Musically, For Today was standard metal core — gang vocals, screams both high and low and At The Gates-esque solos on top of crunchy breakdowns. Truthfully, the only thing that stood out was their huge-print “Repent or Perish” and “You Will Be Judged” t-shirts.

Then just like Saturday, the crowd started to thin.

Call me an ass hat, but both of Sunday’s headliners, Bury Your Dead and Throwdown blended together so seamlessly that both sets became an hour and a half block of steroid-fueled, breakdown centered, weight lifting anthems.

To be fair, Bury Your Dead infuses a bit cleaner Killswitch Engage inspired (or even Shinedown) vocals while Throwdown has been a second-rate Pantera for the past few years.

Twelve years and a handful of member changes ago, Throwdown was a goofy Southern California straight edge hardcore band that covered “Baby Got Back” and wrote a song with the sole lyrics of “Get Sick Motherfucker.”

For those unfamiliar, here's an ad for the ever-popular one-string Throwdown signature guitar. Only $499!

Somewhere along the way, things got serious. No more jokes, instead it’s time to tour with Children of Bodom and Hatebreed, throw in some southern rock (and nu metal) influence and rule the world…or maybe not.

Turns out there couldn’t have been more than 100 or so show goers spread out inside what was earlier a very packed Studio Seven as Throwdown played songs from their newest release, Deathless, a far cry from the packed Seattle shows Throwdown headlined in the early part of the decade. Maybe things would have gone better if they had played 7th or 8th.

Next time this fest roles around, it would be interesting to see the lineup mixed a bit more. Instead of lumping 14+ death metal bands on one day and 14+ “hardcore” bands into the next, why not throw Bury Your Dead on before Vital Remains or even For Today before The Faceless. Let’s just be careful not to start a holy war.