Beartooth with Motionless In White, Stick To Your Guns, and Nothing Left
Summit
Denver, Colorado
January 13th, 2020
A sunless sky hung over the Summit Music Hall in downtown Denver as the masses gathered not for warmth—but to queue up for entrance into the venue. Hosting some of the top talents in the metal scene coming into the new decade, fans couldn’t be more eager to fill every free inch of space leading up to the stage as they pushed through the entryway doors.
Claiming responsibility for the immediate full standing room floor, Nothing Left opened the night’s concert with their new sound. Forming just three years ago and with two albums under their belt, this ensemble claims members from ‘For Today’, ‘Silent Planet’ and ‘Bullet for a Pretty Boy’. Songs including “Death from Above” and “Choose Your Side” could be heard echoing down the quiet Denver streets in the late winter evening.
Stopping only briefly during their set to rally the crowd, Stick to Your Guns acted as a strong Segway into the night’s headliners. Sounds of fan favorites such as “Nobody” and “Amber” knocked the air out of my lungs as I stood under the stage taking in the band’s unmatched energy. No stranger to hosting equally large crowds as the main act, the Orange County, CA native frontman Jesse Barnett left an unforgettable impression on the crowd with his strong lyrics and even more impactful speech akin to something you could expect to have seen from Rage Against the Machine’s Zack De La Rocha in their heyday.
The co-headliners seem to trade the ‘closing’ act nightly, with the coin toss giving the Summit’s next setlist to Motionless in White. The Scranton, PA metalheads have come a long way from when I caught their shows circa 2007. The band has made a name for themselves through not only the heavy-hitting sounds of songs played such “Devil’s Night”, but also through their unique style that turns heads and very obviously bleeds into that of the onlooking crowd. Accompanied with their heavier songs were some beloved ballads that left fans hanging off the upper-level staircase railings as they sang along to “Another Life” and the bands closing “Eternally Yours.”
With little time to power to the merchandise stand, the closing act ascended to the stage. Beartooth hit the crowd with the first song from their 2014 Album, Disgusting. The transition between their opener “The Lines” and the follow-up, “Hated” left no doubt that the Ohio rockers were aiming to bring down the ceiling to the foundations. With almost no song unable to be sung along to, frontman Caleb Shomo ended the night by belting fan-favorite “In Between” from the stage, hardly able to be seen through the fog-covered mosh pits I pushed into following the photo-capture portion of my experience.
No band present was a stranger to Denver, and we can only hope these familiar tour busses grace the Summit Music Hall curb again someday very, very soon.
