Omen Concert Review, Laredo, TX, September 8, 2018
Omen in Laredo? OK, why not? My friend Lisa and I drove in to Laredo late night after the Scorpions show (see previous post) to meet up with her husband and his family for the weekend. I was pretty wiped out by the time we got there and fell asleep pretty quickly. We got up the next morning, did some running around town and some sightseeing since I had never been there and saw a lot of the places where the two of them were familiar with as they grew up there. That was cool getting some of their history mixed in. We met up with our friend, Mina, at El Popo for some torta type sammiches then went and had a couple of drinks before heading back to the house to chill before the evening’s festivities.
We met up with Mina again at a bar and had a couple of drinks then went to the venue. It wasn’t a big place but was about what I expected. There were three death metal bands opening. None of them were my thing but the crowd dig them. Two were from Monterrey, MX and the other, Severance, were from the valley, I believe. They’ve apparently been around for a long time. I was there for Omen exclusively.
I saw Kenny Powell from Omen for a quick minute before the show and met the new singer. The bands were all sharing a backline, so there was no real set up time. I moved straight to the front. I LOVE OMEN. The JD Kimball era (RIP) falls within my top 15ish bands of all time. I also liked the Kevin Goocher stuff and thought Hammer Damage was a strong album. Omen had released 2 songs online with Nikos who is their new singer from Crete. All I can say is that he pretty much nails the JD sound, be it contrived or naturally. He’s also a super nice guy.
They opened with Termination and rolled through the classics until playing Alive from the new EP. They also played Evil Seductress from that as well. The set was killer and other than the 2 new songs, I was singing along with everything. I was fully energized by the show and the band was great overall minus a couple of technical issues with Kenny’s effect pedal board. He’s got such a unique sound and it was great to hear most of my favorite Omen songs, especially Torture Me and Teeth of the Hydra.
I look forward to seeing them again…and again.
The Metal Files 
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