Hammerfall - The Orpheum - Tampa Florida - May 17th, 2017

​

 Swedish Power Metal Templars Hammerfall, along with Dutch Symphonic Metal Powerhouse Delain, made a VERY well received stop at The Orpheum in Tampa (Ybor City) Florida on Wednesday, May 17th 2017. According to a statement that Joacim Cans made from the stage, this was apparently the bands first ever stop in Florida. This was the second to last stop on the US leg of the Built to Last tour with the final show being in Atlanta the following night. Delain is touring in support of their 2016 release Moonbathers.

 

 To be honest, we were there mainly for Hammerfall, Delain is an amazing band but Hammerfall is one of our favorites! We had only seen the band one time before back in 2005 In New York City. We also met Joacim Cans and Oscar Dronjak at a CD release party also in New York City. 

 

 Being that The Orpheum show was on a Wednesday, we had to fight rush hour traffic to head up to Tampa as we live about 45 miles or so away. We made decent time and arrived at the venue to a short line of Metallers, all dressed in black of course, already on the sidewalk outside. The Orpheum is one of our least favorite venues in the Tampa / St. Petersburg area to see a show, it is especially hard as a concert photographer to get decent photos there. The lighting isn't all that great, there is no photo pit and there are roof support columns right in front of the stage, on the plus side, it's a decent size venue, it's in a good area being right on the main strip in Ybor City, it has a VIP area upstairs with some seating, if you get to the venue early you can get a great spot right up against the stage within feet of the band but the biggest plus is that they have some GREAT concerts there!

 

 This tour was a co-headlining type tour but from what I have read, Hammerfall has been the first main band to perform, with Delain closing the show on most nights with the exception of  two shows where the order was reversed. There have also been local acts opening the concert with one local band performing before Hammerfall. The two Headliners both performed for approximately the same length of time, somewhere around one and a half hours each. The venue was pretty well packed, especially for a Wednesday night, my guess is that if this show had been on a Friday or Saturday night it would've sold out. I inquired with a member of the venue's staff about how large the crowd was but he told me that he was only allowed to let that be known to the promoter of the show, kind of odd as I've been doing the concert photography/review thing for years and I've never had trouble getting that information anywhere else. Whatever the number was it was pretty impressive!

 

 When the doors opened at 7:00 pm we entered the venue and ran into a bunch of friends, it is amazing how because of our love of Metal we have met so many people with the same interest over the years! There is nothing like a great concert to bring friends together to share the experience, and what an experience this show was! The excitement in the air was palpable as everyone was pumped up for the main event, the ONLY disappointment being that there wasn't much tour merchandise left for sale, understandable as the tour was coming to a close the following night.

 

 HammerFall took the stage to a huge cheer from the crowd and proceeded to kick our asses! Joacim sounded amazing as always and interacted with the crowd quite a bit. Everyone had their fists in the air and seemed to be having a great time. This is one of the better shows we have seen since moving to Florida almost 9 years ago. During their set, Joacim greeted us with "Good evening Templars of Tampa, Florida." He also said that we were the best and most vocal crowd on the entire tour. The entire band really seemed to be having fun, huge smiles all around. Guitarist Oscar Dronjak came out with a hammer shaped guitar which he played off and on during the entire show. It was very cool looking! Some of our personal favorite highlights of the evening were Riders Of the Storm, Renegade, Let the Hammer Fall, and the epic Metal Anthem Hammer High off their latest release Built to Last.

 

Hammerfall's Setlist:

​​

Hector's Hymn

​Riders of the Storm​

Blood Bound​

Any Means Necessary

​Renegade

​Dethrone and Defy

​Last Man Standing

​Let the Hammer Fall​

Built to Last

​Medley to the Brave

​The Dragon Lies Bleeding

​Hammer High

​Bushido

​Hearts On Fire

 

 We had left the venue two songs into Delain's set, but from what we heard they really sounded great and were getting a great response from the crowd. After we left, on our way to the car we ran into the HammerFall guys with the exception of their drummer, Johan Kolberg. We talked to them for a few minutes and got a couple of CD booklets signed. All in all we had a great time and it was an amazing night of fantastic Swedish Power Metal! We would like to thank Hammerfall and Delain for the great show, and Jon Freeman of Freeman Promotions for setting up the press credentials.

​

 Hammerfall consists of members Vocalist Joacim cans, Guitarist Oscar Dronjak, Bassist Fredrik Larsson, Guitarist Pontus Norgren and Drummer Johan Kolberg.

 

Delain's Setlist:

​

Hands of Gold

Go Away

The Glory and the Scum

Suckerpunch

Get the Devil Outta Me
Army of Dolls
The Hurricane

Here Come the Vultures

Fire with Fire

Pendulum

Sleepwalkers Dream

Not Enough​

Mother Machine

Don't Let Go

We Are the Others

​

 Delains line up is Johanna Charlotte Wessels on vocals, Keyboardist Martijn Westerholt, Guitarist Merel Bechtold, Guitarist Timo Somers, Bassist Otto Schimmelpenninck Van Der Oije and Drummer Ruben Israel.​​

​