Average Joes got a lot rowdy with the Cancer Bats, who brought ear blistering metal to Lethbridge, Oct. 5. I arrived at the end of their first set of original music.
They had a good sized crowd cheering in front of the stage and they made the Beastie Boys’ “Sabotage” their own.
That was just a taste of what was to come with Bat Sabbath, the Cancer Bats’ Black Sabbath playing alter egos, which was next.
This wasn’t your daddy’s Sabbath — it was faster, louder, angrier and more menacing than their original.
And while it is a challenge to hit Ozzy Osbourne’s high notes, especially in his heyday, Cancer Bats frontman Liam Cormier, clad in a black cape for the set, didn’t even try.
He belted out classic Black Sabbath’s most menacing songs and the hit “Paranoid,” in his inimitable raspy voice which sounded like a cat possessed with a fishbone stuck in its throat, and in doing so made Sabbath their bitch. Well not quite.
But they definitely made the songs their own. There was punishing bass and thunderous guitar riffs and a shuddering drum beat throughout.
