Last Saturday on 10/17/09, I was among the first to arrive when the doors opened on True Metal America's Iron & Steel Festival at Hangar 84 Concert Studios in Vineland, NJ. The venue is very new and I was impressed with the place. It's not too big, but not too small. The stage has plenty of room for the bands to shake things up. They have a decent snack counter and a small bar with beer and mixed drinks was set up. My only complaint is that the sound system wasn't tweaked quite right to my ears. Most of the bands' sound was somewhat muddy and the guitars in particular didn't come through well.

   Upon arrival I had a chat with Ski, the vocalist of Faith Factor, who I later learned had organized the concert. I think he did a fantastic job. I've never seen such quick and orderly band changes as I did at this show. Unfortunately the spectator turnout was very low. However, I overheard Frank from the band Krank saying to someone about the low turnout, (and I'm paraphrasing) "I've done it before. I've performed for five and I've performed for five-hundred. It doesn't matter, I give it everything I got when I get up there" And they sure as hell did. I heard several other people express the same attitude. It's all about the music. So if we want the music to keep being made by talented, dedicated people like this, we fans have to do all we can to support them. This is why I started this site.

   I think Ski got together a great line-up for the show. I didn't love all of them, but not one was bad, but I don't want to become a critic on this site. There are enough of them on the web. I respect anyone who puts in the time and effort required to make music, especially original music. There was something for everybody. I'll just say this: Ravage is one of my favorites (Ravage the Earth!), Faith Factor does a spectacular stage show (flawless costume changes Ski!) Burning Shadows caught my ear and I'm digging their album, Krank is an old band new again - I'll be watching them, if you like old school thrash check out Lethal Strike, and honestly I didn't know what Ross the Boss was up to these days-post Manowar, but I do now and he made a new fan out of me, I really like his vocalist Patrick Fuchs too.

   KarlsMetal "Long Distance Award" goes to: Kreyson for coming from the Czech Republic ---nice show guys!

KarlsMetal "Proved their metal mettle by breaking down 4 times on the way from Oregon, finally renting a U-haul, riding in the back, in the cold, in the dark, with the equipment, and still made it to the show in New Jersey (thank God!) award goes to: RAVAGE!!!!!!!! You can read the whole story about that on their site ----go to my links section. One more shout out to Ski, thanks again, keep it true! Hope you'll organize another show soon. ------Karl