Review by Brian McLean
When Candlemass returned to the stage in 2002 with the heavily respected line up of Messiah Marcolin, Leif Edling, Mats Bjorkman, Lars Johansson, and Jan Lindh, the reunion was of European doom metal royalty and met with the highest respect from the legions of Candlemass fans.
The band toured extensively throughout Europe for nearly two years with the final blowout show of the reunion scheduled for their hometown of Stockholm, Sweden where the band filmed the show for a future live DVD release.
The show would turn out to be a unique one; the band would compile their set list of Candlemass material that had never really seen the light of day on the stage. The set list would be a rare occurrence for the Candlemass enthusiast in attendance.
That final show filmed in Stockholm as planned has now been released on DVD titled The Curse of Candlemass through Escapi Music and Candlemass fans could not have expected anything better than the results.
An impressive pro shot 14 song Candlemass show includes a set consisting of classic songs from the impressive debut Epicus Doomicus Metallicus, Nightfall, Ancient Dreams, Tales of Creation and an unreleased song titled “Witches” that would be released on the self titled disc through Nuclear Blast in 2005.
The entire show as a whole is outstanding from the audio, camera angles, and the band on stage to the denim and leather wearing, heading banging in unison Swedish crowd. The European metal fans never lost it.
If there would be a disappointment of the release, it would only be a minor one. Marcolin addresses the crowd in his native tongue and not English so unless the viewer speaks the language, they will be lost until the band starts playing.
On the other hand, it’s unique seeing Marcolin address the crowd in the unknown language to an English speaking only consumer.
As standard with a music DVD, there is bonus material consisting of a one hour interview with Candlemass and nearly one hour of rare live cuts from 1987 – 1993.
For the final show of the reunited tour, Candlemass went out on top. Luckily the departure after the reunion was short lived for the doom metal band again reunited with the same line up prior to the DVD being released.
Bring out the candelabras for The Curse of Candlemass has been lit and the legacy of this band will continue to burn.