A metal frontman performed just long enough to get fans’ hopes up at a Festival concert before ditching the gig after 2 minutes.
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On Aug. 14, at Finland, Tampere’s Saarihelvetti music festival, metal band Abbath took the stage, then promptly stepped right off it. However, metal fans may have had an idea of what was coming…
Per metal outlet Inferno, the band’s frontman, Immortal founding member Abbath Doom Occulta, real name Olve Eikemo, sauntered on stage without his signature makeup or armor, akin to the infamous makeup-free early ’80s KISS era.
The metal outfit reportedly played most of their track “To War!” before the Norwegian musician decided to call it quits. Fan footage shows Eikemo tossing his guitar to the floor of the stage before stomping off. The rest of the band, who actually showed up dressed in their best theatrical metal outfits, followed their moody frontman off stage.
The band’s drummer, Ukri Suvilehto, later apologized for the extremely short show, telling festival concertgoers, “Let’s just say that it probably won’t come as a surprise to anyone that our lead singer is struggling with health problems, so we’re very sorry if this gig has been interrupted.”
“But we, as solid professionals, are prepared for anything, so we’ll see,” he added. “But thank you and sorry. We have done everything we can.”
Fans React to Metal Frontman Ditching Festival Concert Gig After 2 Minutes
The comments section on YouTube of the onstage antics was full of mixed reactions from metal fans.
“As soon as he came out with no corpse paint, I knew it was over. Get yourself better, man,” one fan wrote. “Tip of the hat to Ukri (The Drummer) for standing up, explaining, and apologizing to a probably not-too-thrilled crowd,” another fan offered.
“The only “full show” that could be a YouTube short,” another metal fan joked about the fan footage, which clocks in at under eight minutes, even with Suvilehto’s apology.
As of this writing, Abbath hasn’t addressed the abandoned performance.