On Sunday 25th March, the Dutch band, Within Temptation, played in La Riviera, Madrid. They are already involved in their last album's tour, The Heart of Everything. They showed us many of their new songs and other ones from their previous albums. The room was crowded and the audience was completely dedicated to the band, which had a great gig. Javier Tendero / Leticia Ballester

They are becoming keen on Spain, and we had the chance of seeing Lauren Harris' band (Steve Harris' daughter, from Iron Maiden) which will be with Within Temptation in many other gigs during their European tour.

The opening was at 8:00 pm, and the room was being full of people despite the fact that 2 hours were left to the Within Temptation's performance. At 20:45 pm, with no delay, Lauren Harris and her band were playing on the stage. This band is formed by Lauren Harris (vocals), Randy Gregg (bass guitar), Richie Faulkner (electric guitar) and Tom McWilliams (drums).

This band has a rock style, but not very heavy, because they made everyone move during the show with their music. They began their show and encouraged the people at the room, and despite not being known in Spain, we could see that they were looking forward to encouraging the people, and they did their best on the stage. There were some guitar solos done by Richie Faulkner, and Tom McWilliams was protagonist as well with drums. And there was something else in common to all the band members and it was a very nice atmosphere that we could notice between them all, always smiling, and doing their best with much strength and entertainment which were transmitted to the audience.

Although we saw that Lauren Harris is 22 years old, she is surrounded by authentic musicians with much quality who have been playing for many years, and it gives certain safe to this band. Because although Lauren Harris hasn't been much time as a head of the band, all these musicians know perfectly what it means to live from their music, and they demonstrated that they know very well how to encourage the audience during this show in Madrid.

Once Lauren Harris finished their show, we ha to wait about 40 minutes to see Within Temptation's one. This band has become well known in Spain because of the success that they had two years ago with their album The Silent Force, which is enough to ensure the success in this last European tour with The Heart of Everything. The band is formed by: Sharon den Adel (vocals), Robert Westerholt (electric guitar), Jeroen van Veen (bass guitar), Martijn Spierenburg (keyboards), Ruud Jolie (electric guitar) and Stephen van Haestregt (drums).

After this break, suddenly the music in the room and the lights were put out and the people were nervous because of the beginning of the show. We could only see a huge curtain on the stage with Within Temptation's logo in it. There was a new intro for this tour, and suddenly the curtain fell off to the ground and the band appeared with one of their new songs, Our Solemn Hour, directly with the chorus very high which made everyone sing from the beginning of the song.

After the chorus, Sharon appeared on the stage, and many people began to shout and make photographs from every angle of the room. The following songs belong to the new album. They were The Howling, which we have been able to enjoy it since last summer because of the promotion of a videogame; and Frozen, which has been said to be possibly their next single.

The next song was Stand my Ground, and it was a very expected song for the people because it was their first famous song in Spain for many fans. After this one, we could hear another song from their previous album, and this one was Forsaken, another well known song by the audience. After these songs from The Silent Force, they followed with more new songs from The Heart of Everything.

In this case, the next songs were The Cross, What have you done? (first single of their last album) and the song which gives the name to this album, The Heart of Everything. The Cross was a perfect song in order to be sung live in concert, because it is a very difficult song and Sharon could demonstrate her ability here because of the different voice tones that we can listen to in it. After this, the band played the new single, What Have You Done?, although Keith Caputo's voice had to be a recording. The second version of the video of this song was played in the big screen, and Sharon pointed the audience with microphone in the parts that Keith Caputo sings in this song. It fitted well because everyone shouted Keith Caputo's parts in the song, and it sounded very powerful. They followed with The Heart of Everything, another difficult song because of the heavy and low tones that we can listen to here, but Sharon was always successful in all the situations.

After this, the most emotional moment occurred, because they played Mother Earth, which was one of the most expected songs. It was the best moment in the concert by now, the melody of it is just impressive and very powerful, besides the spectacular lights that made it even better. From this moment, the band showed us their best known songs. The next one was Angels, another very difficult song which made the audience enjoy with the heavy guitars and the beautiful Sharon's voice.

The following one was another expected song, Hand of Sorrow.This is becoming one of most successful songs of their new album, and it sounded perfect with the beautiful melody (with violin and piano) and Sharon's voice as well. The next one was All I Need, a ballad with a pop music touch which calmed down the audience preparing everything for the next one which was Jillian. This song was simply perfect and full of emotions from the beginning of it, and after so many great songs, the audience was very excited. The last song before the break was The Truth Beneath The Rose, which lasts more than 7 minutes and have a very difficult tone voice, but Sharon just did it perfectly again giving an emotional end with this song.

After the little break, they came back with another very important songs. This last part began with Deceiver of Fools. It was perfect, because with the intro of this song, the audience prepared to jump and shout, and we could live another emotional moment with this song because the whole band seemed to enjoy this song, but specially Ruud felt excited as we haven't seen him yet in that way previously in the concert. The band calmed down the audience again with another beautiful ballad, Memories. This was the second single of their previous album, and it was full of emotions as well, even Sharon kneeled at the stage in front of the audience in order to sing this song. We were reaching the end of the concert, but the band surprised us with a Kate Bush's cover that they did in 2.003, Running Up That Hill. And finally they finished the show with Ice Queen, as it has been usual since many years ago, because this is the song that the band owes a big part of their success to.

Now in order to finish this, we must say that it was an impressive concert, because the room was crowded although not all the tickets were sold out, and the audience were completely excited with the band and vice versa. We will have to wait for the band's success in America after the European Tour and the summer festivals.

Within Temptation Set-list :

1. Our Solemn Hour
2. The Howling
3. Frozen
4. Stand My Ground
5. Forsaken
6. The Cross
7. What Have You done?
8. The Heart of Everything
9. Mother Earth
10. Angels
11. Hand of Sorrow
12. All I Need
13. Jillian
14. The Truth Beneath The Rose
15. Deceiver of Fools
16. Memories
17. Running Up That Hill
18. Ice Queen

Javier Tendero
Photos: Leticia Ballester

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ENLACES RELACIONADOS:

Interview with Sharon den Adel & Ruud A.Jolie
Within Temptation : The heart of Everything // Gun Records ( Sony-BMG )
Within Temptation + Lauren Harris - 26 de Marzo - Sala Apolo ( Barcelona )