Has it really been a year since last year’s excellent Fortress Festival? Apparently so. Fortress has quickly established itself as one of the world’s premier black metal festivals, (some would say THE premier black metal festival), and it’s brilliant to have yet another year with a massive amount of fantastic bands. Increasingly, attendees get to experience some very rare appearances too.
Before we get into it – as was the case last year, this review is greatly enriched by the stunning photographs from the very talented Aleksandra Hogg, so a huge thanks to her once more. I urge you to check out her work at Acidolka here, here, or here.
Day One – Saturday
Groza – Grand Hall
The honour of opening this year’s festival falls to Groza. The main stage looks fantastic with this year’s Fortress designs adorning it. There are five video screens on stage this year, and Groza make better use of them than many.
It’s busy for the band as they step out to start things off. Their contemporary brand of black metal lands well, and they get a good response for their efforts.
Groza benefit from a very clear sound that allows for their sorrowful melodies to come through. With good stage presence and songs that contain a good mix of speed, melody, and atmosphere, it’s a very good start to the day.
Black Cilice – Ocean Room
Black Cilice are the band that everyone seems to talking about today. The queue to get in is massive before Groza have even finished, (although it turns out that this is also in no small part due to some issues around security and entry to the stage, which improve as the day goes on and is fully rectified by day two).
It’s hot in here – the stage crew are handing out water down the front, which is great – and packed, but Black Cilice are a great thing to witness. Cloaked and hooded, bathed in red, and fiercely absorbing, Black Cilice are a rare treat.
They have a clearer sound than they do on record, allowing those lucky enough to be in attendance to experience their raw black metal in a new light. The music exudes menace and harsh atmosphere, with a performance to match. There’s a hypnotic quality to some of band’s material that allows you to just drift away, trapped in the grim blackness of it all.
Against no small amount of expectation Black Cilice have not disappointed.
Mesarthim – Grand Hall
From the underground caverns of Black Cilice to the cosmic openness of main stage Mesarthim. The band light up the stage with their expansive take on grand atmosphere.
The singer has what can only be described as a swirling vortex on his face. It’s a striking focal point, and not something you see everyday. It’s hard to imagine being able see out of, but clearly he can. Sing too.
Mesarthim fill the entire venue with vast blackened sonicscapes. Both the band and the audience are really into it, and it’s a great show worthy of the main stage. Mesarthim are really popular with the crowd, understandably so, as this is a Grade A act performing a potent, affecting set. Through great atmosphere, skilled use of techno elements, a keen understanding of dynamics and showmanship, and more aggression than you might expect, Mesarthim put on a professional, impactful set that was really gosh darn good.
Ossaert – Grand Hall
Yet another rare treat, gracing the main stag with their presence, no less. The excitement is high for Ossaert.
Getting a minor criticism out of the way first – the show loses momentum somewhat between songs, either due to too-long ambient interludes, or a full prerecorded outing of one of their dungeon synth tracks. It’s hard to complain too much though, and when the actual songs start, all is forgiven. They are that good.
Ossaert’s black metal is special, and leagues above most things even vaguely similar. As aired today, each song is as excellent as the last. The singer wears a monk habit as he delivers his superb vocals, and the corpse-painted band all play with passionate intensity. Theirs is a set that’s incredibly engaging.
Ossaert deliver a near-flawless display of blackened might and epic atmosphere.
Midnight Odyssey – Ocean Room
It’s once more packed and hot in the Ocean Room, but a chance to see Midnight Odyssey should not be missed.
Midnight Odyssey take the crowd on a journey into atmosphere-rich realms beyond the night sky. There’s no drummer, and despite some issues with a click track, the rest of the band are hooded, robed, and ready to go. They ably provide a black and doom metal spacescape for the audience to escape to.
This is music that’s all about immersive emotion, and in this Midnight Odyssey excel. The epic clean singing that burnishes the records is reproduced skilfully, and when these are the main method of delivery it can become quite stirring, even transcendent.
Before you know it, it’s over. An enjoyable show from a great band.
Totenwache – Ocean Room
Totenwache’s melodic black metal is on fine form this evening. They have a decent sound and fill the stage with their suitably old-school presence.
Anyone who’s a fan of the classic style would surely find it hard to find fault with Totenwache’s performance. It’s easy to enjoy, and goes down well with the busy crowd. Many of the music’s blazing melodies are real earworms. One of the less typical features of this year’s Der Thron der Uralten is that the bass plays a larger part than is normal for black metal, and it’s prominent during this set too.
Totenwache put on a solid, entertaining set that garners a lot of appreciation from the crowd.
Dødheimsgard – Grand Hall
Now for a big one. The always impressive Dödheimsgard playing their modern classic Black Medium Current in full. Unmissable. The amount of people watching them seems to bear this out, and it’s correspondingly the hottest it has felt in the main room.
Dødheimsgard make use of all five video screens and a comprehensive light show to enhance their performance. There are nine people on stage, including three dedicated backing singers, (who also whip out other instruments when needed). And those people can sing, that’s for sure. As of course can the main singer and the couple of other band members that chip in now and again. There’s a lot going on,. and infectious harmonies are everywhere.
Some early sound issues get smoothed out quickly, and the band get to work filling the airwaves with their highly characterful music. Dødheimsgard give an impassioned performance throughout. It’s a show better than most headliners ever give, so the fact that Dødheimsgard aren’t actually headlining Fortress makes this even more notable.
This is a multifaceted idiosyncratic avant-garde black metal extravaganza. It’s 70 minutes of kaleidoscopic wonder. It is beautiful.
Whoredom Rife – Ocean Room
This one promises to be ferocious. Whoredom Rife dominate the still-sweltering Ocean Room with a raging display of black metal supremacy. The band give an intense performance, absolutely tearing it up as they burn through song after song.
The sound is initially less well-defined than some of the other sets today, emphasising the band’s most brutal and hostile aspects. It doesn’t take too long to improve though, allowing the music’s other qualities to come through more and more. Then, their full power is unleashed.
In some ways Whoredom Rife’s set is reminiscent of Misþyrming’s in 2024, when they had an Ocean Room headlining slot. Misþyrming utterly destroyed the place, and the same is now true of Whoredom Rife. The latter ultimately offer a different experience, with more melody and atmosphere, but the effect is the same – a murderously good adrenaline-charged show. Less violent overall perhaps, but just as effective. Having said that, the later part of the set does birth some full-on pit action, an uncommon sight at Fortress. Regardless, Whoredom Rife rule with an iron fist, closing the Ocean Room with a bang.
Old Man’s Child – Grand Hall
Saturday’s main event is now upon the festival, and it’s clear that for many people this is one of the day’s big draws. It’s a feast of old-school black metal, with a focus on songs and no small amount of symphonic highlights. Old Man’s Child have the hits to keep the people happy, and they run through them like it’s going out of style.
The band dish out classic cut after classic cut, with so many standout riffs, symphonic accents, or songwriting moments that it’s hard to pick out any one moment as the best, although Hominis Nocturna or Soul Possessed could certainly lay a claim on this. Old Man’s Child are consistently great though, so you could happily pick almost anything else they play.
Old Man’s Child well and truly give it some beans tonight. Galder reveals himself to be one of the more engaging frontmen of the day too. Extremely entertaining, high quality, and downright fun, this is a first rate way to end day one of this year’s Fortress.
Day Two – Sunday
A Forest of Stars – Grand Hall
Fresh from releasing Corpse Stack Overflow, their first album in eight years, the return of A Forest of Stars has been greatly anticipated by many.
They begin with a full bodied sound, with the violin sounding especially striking and bright. A Forest of Stars have an individual take on avant-garde and progressive black metal, which comes across in the live environment as rawer and stronger.
A Forest of Stars deliver a compelling show and the performances are all on point. The band’s hallucinogenic graphics are very effective across the five video screens. Combined with the idiosyncratic music, it makes for an immersive experience.
A fitting, very enjoyable opening to day two of Fortress. The crowd roar their approval.
After the set there is an announcement for Fortress Festival 2027 – the legendary Emperor! This clearly makes a lot of people very happy, as the place explodes. Excellent.
This Gift Is a Curse – Ocean Room
This Gift Is a Curse bring with them a level of violent savagery that’s not frequently seen at Fortress. Their sludge-infected black metal is brutally destructive.
With little fanfare they get right down to it, an onslaught of blasting belligerence and sickening sludge groove. Yet, there’s method in their attack that elevates them above ostensibly similar acts, and their music is more varied than one might appreciate at first glance. This manifests live as sheer intensity balanced by a application of dynamics and structuring, all while the band members thrash and tear around the stage like maniacs. From blast beat ferocity to massive walls of slow moving blackened sludge, This Gift Is a Curse paint pictures in the lightless colours of malevolence.
As purveyors of apocalyptic terror, it’s great stuff, it has to be said. Their abrasive extremity is refreshing and invigorating in the venue’s oppressive heat. This Gift Is a Curse destroy the Ocean Room, leaving the crowd satisfyingly brutalised.
Abigail Williams – Grand Hall
Confidently taking to the stage, Abigail Williams bring their shapeshifting black metal to Fortress. Apparently it might be their last UK show ever. If so, it’s a great venue for them to do it at.
Pulling songs from across many of their quite diverse albums, the band deliver a set that ranges far and wide, while still being rooted in black metal. The breadth and depth of the material is an asset to the band, and today it’s well-rendered in the Grand Hall. The clean singing sounds especially good.
At one point technical issues cause everything to stop mid-song, and whatever the issue is has to be fixed. Once done, they actually somehow come back with a stronger, more well-rounded sound.
A solid set from Abigail Williams.
Fluisteraars – Grand Hall
In 2024 Fluisteraars put on a great show in the Ocean Room. They’ve now been promoted to the Grand Hall, showcasing their individual form of black metal that comes with a set of flavours all of its own. On the main stage these flavours and accompanying textures saturate the venue, seeping into all of the nooks and crannies. It’s a taste that many have acquired, and Fluisteraars are welcomed enthusiastically.
It’s a strong set, and Fluisteraars make the transition to the bigger stage with ease. Playing with no backdrops or anything other than the light show, it’s all about the exceptional music. The band are absorbed in their performances. All of them are in their own well-crafted worlds, but the singer in particular catches the eye frequently with his expressive delivery. He even gets to enthusiastically pound a conveniently placed drum during Brand Woedt in Mijn Graf.
It’s great to see an act so engrossed in their worldbuilding. They finish things off with a brand new song off their upcoming album, which slots in naturally at the end of their set, almost like an old friend that you’re meeting for the first time.
Fluisteraars treated the Grand Hall audience to a captivating performance. Despite its size, it felt wonderfully intimate.
Antrisch – Ocean Room
Antrisch are a band that are on the rise, and it wouldn’t be surprising to see them grace much larger stages in the future. For now, they’re here, and they make their mark quite convincingly. They make a good impression as they introduce the Ocean Room to their thematic brand of black metal.
The band look the part, and even seem to be in-character in some ways, with their tailored facial expressions and mannerisms. They work the crowd well, and their show has the feeling of somewhere between a well-considered professional music performance, and a theatrical production of sorts.
Antrisch focus most of their set on material from their debut album Expedition II: Die Passage. However, before the end they leave the stage for a brief costume change, and then we’re into the new record Expedition III: Renitenzpfad, playing two songs, (the first of which is opener Conquista – Prolog, a set highlight).
Throughout the entire set Antrisch put on a great show. There’s something so self-assured about their bearing that would be intimidating if it wasn’t so entertaining. The hype around Antrisch seems justified. This was a commanding performance from the band, and a remarkably enjoyable one. Antrisch were brilliant.
Vespéral – Ocean Room
Vesperal are playing all of their excellent 2025 record La Mort de L’âme. It’s fair to day that there are many who have been looking forward to this, and it’s getting busier by the moment.
As the acoustic strains of the first track begin, there’s an appreciative roar of anticipation. The band ascend to the stage cloaked and robed, and the album’s journey begins in earnest. Then the singer appears, robes half hanging off, (discarded after a few songs), and proceeds to be a ball of energy for much of the rest of the show. He clearly loves what he’s doing, and his enthusiasm is infectious. He’s a natural showman.
Vespéral deliver a highly engaging performance. The singer leads the band through a set that gets people moving more than most other acts this weekend. Despite the band’s attire and the overall style they play, their punk qualities come through live even more clearly, which definitely contributes to the increase in crowd responsiveness. Alongside this, the live experience reinforces how danceable much of the material is. It’s got a damn good beat much of the time, so it’s no wonder people are animated. It’s music you can bounce to, and some do. There is even a crowd surfer at the end of the set.
Vespéral are just that good though, regardless of the reason, and the audience are having a whale of a time. The band’s live show is a fun one, and the atmosphere is electric. They go down an absolute storm.
This is the sort of set Fortress legends are made of.
Misþyrming – Grand Hall
Like Fluisteraars, Misþyrming played in 2024 in the Ocean Room, and now they too have been upgraded. It was a potent performance, so today promises to be the most aggressive of all of the main stage acts.
Theirs is a punishing set, riven with inscrutable dissonance and tense darkness. It’s a masterclass in Icelandic hostility. The music is powered by molten lava and frozen ice. The songs adapt to the large room, filling the space with destructive grooves and blistering blasts.
Misþyrming look at home on the larger stage. The band give 100% effort, delivering a performance that more than earns its Grand Hall position. A good slice of the audience seem just as pumped up as the band are, (circle pit and stage diver and all). Misþyrming are surprisingly popular, given their extremity, and it’s great to see them get the response they deserve.
Misþyrming’s set just gets better and more enjoyable the longer they play, so when it does inevitably come to an end, you’re left wanting more. Boasting the feel of a headliner set, it’s superb work from Misþyrming.
Darkened Nocturn Slaughtercult – Ocean Room
Now it’s time for the true Germanic darkness of Darkened Nocturn Slaughtercult. The Ocean Room is hot, airless, and heaving. The band emerge like something out of myth, before showing everyone exactly what they’re made of.
The venue is cut to ribbons by vicious scything guitars and beaten into submission by merciless drums. The band’s iconic singer unleashes venomous screams and howling fury as the music relentlessly rips through the crowd. Dressed in spectral white, which ends up covered in fake(?) blood at the end of the show, she has a magnetic personality that pulls in all light towards her.
It’s a formidable display of occult Satanic might. The response they get borders on adoration in places, and it’s hard not to see why. Darkened Nocturn Slaughtercult reap a fierce tally throughout their exemplary show.
A triumph of old-school power and supremacy.
Gallowbraid – Grand Hall
With only a single EP to the Gallowbraid name from way back in 2010, it could seem like a curious choice for them to headline the final day of Fortress. It’s paid off handsomely; this is the band’s first live show ever, and the Grand Hall is as busy as you’d expect it to be.
There’s a palatable sense of excitement and expectation even before they start. As you would hope and want, Ashen Eidolon is aired in full. It’s delivered by a band, (including members of Fief and Visigoth), that are obviously big fans of the music, alongside the artist behind Gallowbraid himself, who takes on guitar and clean vocals duties.
The songs that are simultaneously catchy and mood-based, merging atmospheric black metal and epic heavy metal elements so completely in ways that focus on the needs of the music first and foremost. It’s no wonder the songs have achieved cult status. Played live, they are given a new lease of life. Even with the occasional sound hiccup, the band can’t really do any wrong. Gallowbraid get both the blood and the fists pumping. After Ashen Eidolon and Autumn I, two brand new songs are played.
Leafdance is the first. It sounds exactly like something Gallowbraid would do, with an even stronger heavy metal influence that’s stirring. It’s a direct and catchy cut, and the clean singing is amazing. This is followed by Stormcloud Memories. This one sounds even more like a classic Gallowbraid song, like it’s been locked in a forgotten vault this entire time and has only now been freed. Rich in atmosphere, as well as memorability, it ramps up the blackened influences and impresses as it does so.
Both new songs fit right in alongside the rest of the material. Even without the familiarity that comes with the old, they get a riotous response. It bodes very well for the future of Gallowbraid. After that, it’s back to Ashen Eidolon. Both Oak and Aspen and Stone of Remembrance are just as powerful as the EP’s previously played songs.
By the end of it, far earlier than that actually, Gallowbraid have more than earned their headline position. Judging by the crowd response, it’s safe to say that after a 16-year wait, nobody is leaving disappointed.
Gallowbraid’s performance is a fitting way to end such a brilliant two days. A highlight, in a weekend of highlights. Fortress Festival keeps getting better and better, so here’s to the next one.
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