Post #407
On Tuesday, the 21st of April, 2026, a friend invited me to see their favorite new band, Beast In Black. They happened to be opening for the mighty founders of power metal: Helloween. I couldn't say no! Prior to this invite I had only peripheral familiarity with the music of Helloween. I knew the hits, of course. I had collected a couple compilations over the years: The Best, The Rest, The Rare and Unarmed: Best of 25th Anniversary. Additionally, I was completely new to the music of Beast in Black, a fusion of power metal and dance-metal. In the weeks leading up to the show I did a deep-dive into streaming the back-catalogs of both bands.
As the show opened up, Beast in Black gave us "Power of the Beast" to kick off their set, and it was non-stop from there on...
Their set included tracks from each of their 3 albums, and a few non-album singles. Their newest track, "Enter the Behelit", a collaboration with DIABLO video game franchise and inspired by the Berserk manga series, was featured in their set. It was an adrenaline-fused set of power metal from start to finish. They closed with "No Surrender".
Then the stage was changed over and the crowd prepared for Helloween...
Helloween opened their set with a video montage, playing on the gigantic video screen serving as a backdrop to their stage set, that showcased the album covers of their entire discography. As the montage ended they launched into the track, "March of Time" off of their landmark album, Keeper of the Seven Keys, Pt. 2.
After that they proceeded to deliver an excellent setlist of songs from their debut album to their newest with a sampling of everything in between. At a couple places there was an interlude where 'The Keeper', their on-again, off-again mascot, narrated segments of the band's history as an introduction to the next song. You'll find the full setlist at the end of this post with a link to a Spotify playlist.
They featured several songs from their latest album, Giants & Monsters, my favorite of which was "Universe (Gravity for Hearts)", an epic song about space, time, life, love and eternity. I had only played this album a couple times a couple of times, so had not yet established my personal favorites from it. "Universe" is certainly at the top of my list after seeing and hearing it performed live.
Near the end they closed their main set with the epic classic "Halloween". A few minutes later they returned for an encore where they played "Eagle Fly Free", "Power" and "Dr. Stein" with the added bonus of the final chorus from 'Keeper of the Seven Keys".
All in all it was a fantastic night of power metal, from the pioneers of the genre to the new generation that will carry it forward for many more years to come. Please enjoy the setlists for each band. Click the links to save the playlist in spotify.com.
-Power of the Beast
-Hardcore
-Sweet True Lies
-Born Again
-From Hell With Love
-Enter the Behelit
-Die By The Blade
-One Night in Tokyo
-Blind And Frozen
-No Surrender
