Last Monday night I headed to The Underworld in Camden to see Swedish heavy rock band Eclipse on the London date of their Megalomanium tour (included 2 dates in Wakefield and 1 in Nottingham), celebrating songs from their 2023 and 2024 albums of the same name. Well to be accurate the album titles are Megalomanium and Megalomanium II, but vocalist Erik Mårtensson explained that they had recorded a load of songs and then picked (quite at random from the sounds of it) which tracks would make it onto which album.
There was strangely no band, but that meant that Eclipse could play a lovely long set. As soon as they walked onto the stage they took some time to greet the crowd and hand out fist-bumps to the front row, before posing for a photo with the excited room of people…something usually saved for the end of a show, but when everyone was so hyped-up from the start it made perfect sense. They opened with “Roses On Your Grave” from their 2021 album Wired, which I was absolutely delighted by as that album was how I first discovered the band.
For a Monday night I was impressed with how busy the venue was, and people had also been queuing before doors opened. As the band were playing only 4 UK dates (and this was the first time they had been to our shores since 2017) I suspect fans might have travelled from all over the UK to attend. I discovered later that for one fan this was their 80th Eclipse show! There was a fantastic atmosphere in the room and there was a real sense of a gathering of friends, brought together by their love of one band. In between songs the band shared tales with fans of their previous London shows, including on at The Borderline in 2017 where the fire alarm went off and everyone had to stand outside until it was sorted. The band also made sure that their stand-in drummer Magnus Andreasson of Hardcore Superstar (who had stepped out of retirement to play with them on this tour) got the attention he deserved.
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Eclipse are a brilliant live band and more than met my expectations of seeing them live. They played an extensive set list featuring some of my other favourite tracks including “Run For Cover”, “Anthem”, “Got It!”, and the song of theirs that I first heard – “Twilight”. They also played some requests from the crowd including “Bleed & Scream” (from their 2012 debut album of the same name) and some little teases of songs including “House Of The Rising Sun”, before closing their set with the absolute banger that is “Viva La Victoria”.
The air conditioning has been broken in the gig room of The Underworld for a few months now, but the venue staff did a great job of making sure that the crowd were hydrated, with one of the security guards holding up a handwritten sign saying “WATER?” so that those who needed it could have a drink. I personally chose Neck Oil as my liquid of choice, hoping that my contribution to the wet sales would help pay for the air conditioning unit to be fixed before by next visit.
I hope Eclipse make it back to the UK again soon as I had a thoroughly enjoyable evening in what was a very warm room – both physically and emotionally.
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Eclipse: official | facebook | instagram | spotify
Photos by Katie Frost Photography
