2002/06/28, Bex Rock festival, Bex, Switzerland

Written by Alexandre Barette (lexi@thesistersofmercy.de) for Dominion mailing list

At first sight, everything looked a bit strange. The location in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by mountains and a even more cows. The festival site was situated directly beside of an electric power station (Kraftwerk, to provoke some musical metaphors between the power station and Avalanche) and I suddenly had this good feeling, that at least the Doktor wouldn't run out of groove tonight (why didn't they play Body Electric, after all?). The whole site atmosphere was a bit unusual and uncommon. everything looked like a family funfair and the audience was very young. There were children running around as well as their grand-parents. Well, I surely was not the only one wondering about all that scenario the remaining hours 'til 23:30. fortunately, our doubts were kicked away in the very second the gig started.

The show was enormously rocking: Lucretia, Crash and Burn, Anaconda, First and Last and Always (fantastic!), Temple of Love and Vision Thing were blowing everything away. We had a lot of fun in the mosh-pit :) and time to relax a bit during really tremendous performances of Flood I+II and Giving Ground. The sound was really good when regarding the size and type of the venue. Only minus of the night: I missed This Corrosion.

Eldritch seemed to be happy to hit the stage again. A lot of moving, a lot of bizarre poses... great! At the end, he pointed to the front rows and smiled. Think he was more than satisfied, too. Chris and Andrew in the last encore, both dressed in skinny sleeveless Motörhead tops, looked more than great. And yes, Adam was more active than ever. He was enjoying his axe in every body position ;) my girlfriend who saw the Sisters live for the first time, was very impressed by silver-Adam ;)

Unfortunately no new songs as previously announced in the current Sonic Seducer interview with Eldritch. (They're maybe remaining for St.Vith and/or Hildesheim.) It was not that disappointing for me after getting Lucretia as opener and Never Land in the last quarter of the setlist.

Too bad that it was getting very cold after the end of the gig and we had to choose our tent instead of watching the Levellers. Well, I heard their whole gig in the tent as if I layed a few meters from the PA and I decided that I did not miss anything ;)

After 2 hours of sleep only, I'm more than tired. Tired, but happy. Cheers and thanks to Robin, Marijke, Eggi, Frank, Steini, Birte, Jochen, Jürg, Vella (and everybody I forgot) for sharing a bloody great night and having some beers together.

Written by Jürg Hochuli (tune_in_turn_on_burn_out@hotmail.com) for Dominion mailing list

Minor sound problems in the beginning, some (unwanted) guitar feedback and the Doktor been a bit too loud compared to guitars an vocals. The problems were fixed quite fast, and the sound was really good and balanced for the rest of the gig; in two words: a huge wall of sound coming from the stage. Huge.

Adam was brilliant. As well as Andy and Chris, but he showcased better his abilities as a guitarist and background singer than in the past.

The gig was limited to 1h1/2, from 23h30 to 01h00. I felt they would have played some more songs and maybe a newie if they had have some more time.

Lucretia My Reflection had slightly different guitar parts, less dominant bass line. Great remix. Snub Nose now has great solo guitar masturbation at the end of the song by Adam. Damn fine little solo melodies, an improvement to last year's version.

I think everyone expected a new song when Adam appeared with his bass on stage for the first encore, knowing that Romeo has already been played. Never Land was a nice surprise anyway

Written by Chris Sampson (Chris@cgs123.demon.co.uk) for Dominion mailing list

Good performance from Von and the boys last night I thought.

Gig was in a tent holding around 3000 or so. I couldn't tell whether Lucretia was heavy or what, being pre-occupied at that point with negotiating (a) the Somme-like conditions in the photo pit, and (b) heckling from the Booies crowd. Never Land didn't have the huge drum sound that it has on record and you kinda lost some of the subtleties that it has on record. Crowd was fairly boisterous. Overall, not as good as Pukkelpop, better than Ternat.

I like Switzerland. I think I'm going to buy a place in Montreux with a view of the lake and mountains and get a big fuck off power boat and terrace around on the lake all day. Ace.

Written by Anders Rehnsberg (heartland@home.se) for Dominion mailing list

Great gig, great place with a lot of high mountains around the place. The only thing who disturbed me was that the bass line and the drums where to high mixed otherwise great sound at such a small stage.

One-liner of the evening:

Eldritch:
Guru, where is my cloud?
Thank you!
That's not a very big cloud Guru.

Would't had gone to Switzerland on vacation if it wasn't for The Sisters, thanks ;) Hi to everyone I've met, apologizes for the drunk tank mode ;)

Had a great time.