Avatar Live! | Ritz Music Venue Raleigh NC
Avatar
I photographed the band Avatar on their tour stop with Trivium at the Ritz in Raleigh. I knew of the band but had never seen them live. I had talked to some other photographer friends of mine who have photographed them and they said the show was a scary, heavy and metal spectacle. They were not kidding! It started with the lights going low and I entered the pit. The Ritz was packed with about 1500 people I think and they were ready to kick ass and take names. The bands started to walk out under the dim lights and the crowd started to go wild. You then see this tall clown faced shadow start to walk towards the stage. Now I am not a fan of clowns so this was an experience. The lights came on full blast and there standing right above me was lead singer Johannes Eckerström staring out into the crowd. I lifted up my camera to photograph him and at that moment he looked directly into the lens and I took the picture. Unfortunately it was out of focus but it still startled me as I found myself looking eye to eye with a tall clown faced singer looking ready to melt faces with hardcore metal. It really is something to see.
The band started in with their first song and the crowd went absolutely fucking nuts. They were screaming back the lyrics and even at one point Johannes stopped singing and let the fans take the lead. The rest of the band was incredibly energetic and played with the intent of making sure all the metal heads remembered that night. The bands concert is truly a sight to behold and if you are a fan of Avatar then you will not be one bit disappointed in their live show. They arrive ready to melt faces with their guitar screaming metal sound and they will deliver that face melting metal performance.
Avatar is a heavy metal band, formed in Gothenburg, Sweden in 2001. The band has released seven studio albums, the most recent being Avatar Country in 2018. The band has had some success on US rock radio as well, notably with their song "New Land", which peaked at number 20 on the Billboard Mainstream Rock Songs chart in May 2017.
