2 SHOW PREVIEW: Sanctuary Reunion at El Corazon

The late 80's were a time of excess in the metal world. People were still buying records and bands like Metallica and others were headlining stadiums across the world. Seattle had a big part in ending all that when Nirvana and Soundgarden pushed Guns N Roses and their bloated contemporaries into a time of well deserved obscurity. Sadly, when that pruning began, there were a lot of great up and coming metal bands lost when the dust settled. One of those were Seattle natives Sanctuary.

Sanctuary's debut album, "Refuge Denied", was produced by Dave Mustaine, the vocalist of Megadeth, and was an excellent example of what a technically proficient combo of thrash and power metal could sound like. Vocalist Warrel Dane has described his vocal style during that time as Rob Halford on helium. Songs like "Battle Angels" and "Die for My Sins" prove this to be true. The band's second record, "Into the Mirror Black", was a darker and more subdued piece of work that gave the band's growing following a peek into the depth of the band's ambition and talent.

Reportedly pressured by their label to adapt to a changing popular music landscape, Sanctuary called it a day in 1991. It was an unfortunate end to such a promising band but out of the ashes came the band Nevermore, comprised of 3 original members of Sanctuary. Nevermore continues to this day to be one of the best bands playing traditional metal today.

This Friday Sanctuary will play their first show in America in twenty plus years. These sort of reunions can be a bit hit and miss but, with more than half the band still performing and writing music as Nevermore all these years, I'm lead to think this is going to be an amazing show from a band that ended in their prime. Playing with them will be After the Fallout, Deathmocracy, Evangelist and Mechanism. The show is all ages at El Corazon.

Words by Roy Culver