Anthrax – 13/10/98 – Astoria

Now without Dan Spitz, Frank Bello or Joey Belladonna, this would surely be a very different Anthrax to the one I knew and loved from ten years before. It was great to be able to see them in a venue like the Astoria, but the fact that even that wasn’t full was testament to their waning popularity. No idea who the support was, certainly wasn’t memorable.

Anthrax ticket Oct 1998

John Bush (ex Armoured Saint) was Anthrax’s singer now, and although Joey Belladonna had an annoying whiney voice and was convinced he was a Native American Indian, he is the voice of Anthrax for me. No idea who had replaced Dan Spitz and my old mate Frankie Bello either. The old tracks were good, but I really wasn’t in the mood for new material. I had reached the stage in my life where, after a five year sabbatical largely spent listening to electronic music in a field somewhere in Hampshire, I was revisiting old metal bands for the nostalgia factor, and I was really only interested in the music I knew when I was into them the first time round. Yes, I’m sure the ‘new’ Anthrax stuff was alright, but I was just there to hear ‘Caught In A Mosh’, ‘I Am The Law’, ‘Metal Thrashing Mad’ and the like. ‘Caught In A Mosh was fantastic, and they finished with a brilliant ‘Bring The Noise’, but ultimately, this was a pale imitation of the Anthrax of old. Glad I went though.

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