So I arrived at the mighty DenFest with my own band KAINE who were on the bill. We were a fairly late addition, but we were nonetheless excited, with such acts as DENNIS STRATTON'S REMUS DOWN BOULEVARD headlining, with NEVERWORLD, THE DEEP, and DEATH VALLEY KNIGHTS among some of the others I was personally looking forward to.
 

The event kicked off with ZENTHETIX, who injected some energy into the event from the word go, with their guitarist dashing about with his wireless kit. These guys were fairly heavy, especially in the guitars and bass, with quite good stage presence. The singer really made use of the vocal effects pedal he had brought along with various reverb and harmony effects, peaking with a cool loop moment that he harmonised over himself. The drummer was a definite hard hitter and you could hear it! I later found out that he broke a bass drum pedal as well.
 

My own band KAINE were up next. Obviously it would be biased of me to review myself, but I will say we gave it our all on stage, and the monitor sound was pretty good up there too. I asked a few people around after our set, people were quite positive about us and if the amount of merch we sold 5 minutes later is any indication, we did good!
 

KODIAK JACK came on just after that, with a heavy Rock sound, with some very well performed and dynamic vocals that proved quite versatile throughout their set. These guys came across as really professional, with some really great songwriting and catchy choruses, with a cool layered sound.
 

THE DEEP followed from them, and this was certainly an experience! Their history ties up with the 80's NWOBHM legends DEEP MACHINE, featuring ex members, and their set was suitably old school! They had twin guitar harmonies without going into too much IRON MAIDEN territory, with some heavy basslines supporting throughout. Their style covered the more metal stuff to some more bluesy material. I would describe their style as 80's NWOBHM mixed with a bit of BLACK SABBATH (a little bit of Tony Martin meets Dio in the vocals in places). These guys were one of the highlights of the evening, with a pro performance and some great tunes.
 

DEATH VALLEY KNIGHTS were another band I was looking forward to seeing, having reviewed their EP "Nothing Left To Steal" a while back. They had a cool intro tape before smashing into their set; these were one of the heaviest bands on the fest. They had heavy chunky riffs meeting some more melodic moments, with a kind of modernised JUDAS PRIEST style. The vocals were quite dynamic, going from gruffer stuff to more high and clean vocals. These guys had plenty of stage presence, moving around the stage and pulling various poses and faces during shredding solos and thunderous riffs. They even put together a cover of "Breaking The Law" for the guys at DenFest! One thing I found out later was that this was their new bass player's first gig with the band, and with that noted he played really well, pounding through the songs and giving his all on stage so I am quite impressed! They finished off their set in style  with a shout of "Drink with us and buy our shit!"
 

SPIRAL DIVE were up next. These heavy rockers brought a thick groove with them, with some great basslines featuring some interesting effects! The drummer was quite a powerhouse, slamming through the material with great force. There were some cool groove oriented moments, with some cool bass only moments that got the crowd clapping to the beat.
 

Following on from them, NEVERWORLD brought their brand of Progressive Metal to the stage, featuring thoughtful keyboards, dramatic drumming and powerful vocals in their rather epic set. They were reminiscent of Progressive Power Metal like STRATOVARIUS, with a heavier leaning towards the keyboard stuff. The vocals from Ben Colton were fantastic, melodic and aggressive with nice high screams too. There were plenty of skilful solos throughout their set too, with plenty going on in each song. A string broke at one point leading to a little jam between members, before they carried on playing material from their new album, "Visions Of Another World". Their songs feature plenty of light and shade, with some great songwriting and nice long tracks.
 

And finally, Dennis Stratton took the stage with his nigh-on legendary REMUS DOWN BOULEVARD. I'm sure most Metalheads know the history but Dennis was the lead guitarist in IRON MAIDEN's early years and features on their debut self-titled album! REMUS DOWN BOULEVARD offer something you wouldn't really expect though, with a mixture of cover songs and original material that straddles the line between Blues jamming and Rock. They take songs like Neil Young's "Southern Man" and turn it into something absolutely astounding, with great guitar playing, vocal harmonies and all around great musicianship from a really tight unit. One of my other favourites from the set was one of their own called "Gunrunner" which has a nice blues rock sound to it before kicking off into some unexpected twin guitar harmonies, and the times they performed some slower ballad style numbers was really great too. Dennis and his fellow guitarist/vocalist Dave Edwards had some hilarious stage banter going on, and Dave throughout the set was actually dealing with some post operation throat damage so it was really admirable to see him getting up there and performing so well!
 

Overall DENFEST was a corker! It would have been nice to see more people there, but they certainly missed out. I can't really put it down to any specific reason, the bands worked hard for the event, and the promoter Dean Archer, really did try his best in this regard too. DJ Demonize Debz did a good job of compering the event, between getting people back indoors for the bands and putting some tunes on between! The sound was run pretty well; when I was on stage I could hear the vocals great which for me is really important.

 Overall this was a good event, it would be nice to see something like this again, and many probably will at the Rock Den's next event Power And Glory Fest which will feature some epic old school bands like WITCHFYNDE, DEEP MACHINE, and TOLEDO STEEL. Good stuff!

Special thanks go to Sally Newhouse at Punkrocksal Media for letting me use her photos of the event.