Nightwish

Live at The Greek Theatre

Los Angeles, California

May 1st, 2015

Review and Photos by Travis Baumann

Nightwish are one of the most renowned Symphonic Metal bands in the world. The band hails from Finland but their latest addition, the amazing Floor Jansen on vocals, is Dutch in background.

I have seen them several times over the years and each time they have had a different vocalist. I am happy to say that Floor is just breathtaking. Her voice, presence and charisma flood from the stage.

Nightwish brought with them some outstanding support acts with the Dutch Symphonic Metallers, Delain and the Swedish kings of Militaristic Power Metal, Sabaton.

They were playing The Greek Theatre in Los Angeles, nested back in the hills and tree lines of Griffith Park. The moon was near full and hovering over us when Nightwish took the stage.

The set opened with bright blue lights shining out towards the audience so you could not make out much on stage. "The Greatest Show on Earth" played as introduction with narration from a male voice setting the tone.

Each of the band members made their way to the stage with cheers from the audience, Floor coming out last to what built into a deafening roar.

As the audience settled down and the intro piece finished they went directly into "Shudder Before the Beautiful". It is one of their new songs off of the latest album, "Endless Forms Most Beautiful".

I have seen Floor perform before with her other project ReVamp, which was also amazing, but the storytelling aspects and vocal delivery vary quite a bit from the classical, almost operatic magnitude of Nightwish, so this was an altogether different and more powerful experience.

They continued the set with "Yours is an Empty Hope". Tuomas' keyboards and symphonic orchestrations play a huge part in their sound, and as such he is up front to the left side of the stage.

Marco, the bassist, also plays an important part with his vocals lending a male offset to Floor on different songs and has always been a great asset to Nightwish's sound.

They did "Amaranth", followed by "She Is My Sin" before coming to the title track off the new album, "Endless Forms Most Beautiful".

The new album is the first to feature Floor on vocals and while it is totally in line with the esoteric, fantastic realm that Nightwish has always conjured, it does reflect a noticeable influence of her powerful essence.

Some of their songs are moving, epic ballads. Storytelling at its musical best, their songs bridge emotional peaks, going from joy to sadness to anger... but what the last few albums have summoned the strongest is a sense of wonder.

This wonderment leads us to a place where the imagination takes control and you travel with your "guides". Floor and company prove to be the best of guides as they lead us through the intricate layers.

As "My Walden" came to a close, the band receded from the stage except for Marco. He began to sing and play "The Islander" solo on the stage.

Marco is really impressive (I also love his other project Tarot) as he stood alone, carrying an amphitheater of thousands before the rest of the band came back out to finish the song.

Nightwish's new single "Élan" was up next and they followed that with one of my favorites from the new album, "Weak Fantasy". With mentions of witchcraft combined with the wicked strength of their signature use of "Symphonic Force" as I like to call it, they cast a spell of music that is of a magnitude that stirs the soul.

Nightwish have been around for twenty years now, so there is a lot of material to choose from for this set list. They played "Storytime" off of their previous album "Imaginarium" before coming to what for me would be the best song of the set, "Dark Chest of Wonders". This song came from the album "Once" and was the last of famed singer Tarja Turunen. Floor absolutely did the song justice, a powerful performance that gave me goosebumps seeing it live after all these years.

The crowd was enraptured in the music and watching the band perform. Their guitarist Emmpu would move from one side of the stage to the other, for one moment playing near Tuomas on keyboards, then side by side with Marco on bass, and then going over to the far right of stage for solos.

Their drummer was hard to make out behind all his gear but you could see his sticks flying across the skins and cymbals.

Recently the band also added Troy on pipes and medieval instruments and he was touring with them as well. He had a place to the right side of stage set up with a mandolin, bagpipes, lutes and other wind instruments.

They played "Alpenglow" and then Floor announced that they were going to a do an old fan-favorite from one of their earliest albums and that we could probably tell by the image projected behind her. The image let us know that it was "Stargazers" and the audience cheered loudly and then sang along to most of the song with her.

They finished up the main set with "Sleeping Sun" before the lights went down, only illuminating the image at the rear of the stage while another piece of "The Greatest Show on Earth" played with more narration.

The band came back out fairly quickly and gave us "Ghost Love Score" followed by "Last Ride of the Day" for the final song of the encore. Another segment of "The Greatest Show on Earth" played while the band came forward and took a collective bow and then waved good night.

It was a great show and an epic performance by the entire band but especially Floor, she really is amazing.

The Greek Theatre is a unique venue and cool choice for a band like Nightwish with the open air, trees and clouds, the beautiful moon above us and fireflies dancing over our heads.

It is weird seeing a metal band in a seated venue however, so I just stood down below from where my seat was because the music is just too moving to not be on your feet.

Click the banner above

to return the navigation page of the

Virtual Night Angel

website