Or “show review” if you’re IGoM.

You might recall from not long ago that I was not hot on the new Castle Rat—it’s produced poorly, all blends together, and feels like a lot of fluff and filler. You might also recall that I had my suspicions that seeing this record live would be a much different story.

And as usual, I was right.

I’ve seen Castle Rat once before, at the same venue nonetheless, and I think The Southern Cafe and Music Hall is the perfect venue to catch them at. I mean, the whole place already feels like a dungeon. The non-restaurant portion of the Cafe where the shows take place is in the basement of the basement, and I’m not entirely sure what the building was before what it is now, but the wall behind the stage is entirely black stone bricks arranged into small arches. It definitely lends itself to a certain The Black Cauldron-ness that I can’t get enough of. I really can’t imagine a more ideal setting to see this band.

After opening with “Phoenix I,” things stayed pretty energetic throughout. I don’t think anyone really moshed at any point, but everyone was groovin’ pretty hard! There seemed to be a consistent spike in energy whenever the band broke into one of the tracks from Into the Realm. The band also addressed one of my big issues with The Bestiary, that being how much of the album feels like it’s just meandering. The part where, on the record, things feel pretty dull were filled with some incredible, blistering solos courtesy of The Count (Franco Vittore), who also provides some backing vocals to harmonize with The Rat Queen (Riley Pinkerton). The mix for the whole show was fantastic. Everything was so crisp and clean and balanced perfectly.

One of the things I love about Castle Rat is just how excited the crowd gets about them. It would be so easy to poo-poo at the costumes and the theatrics, but both times I’ve seen them, the crowd has played along enthusiastically (though to be fair, if you thought it was dumb you’d have probably just stayed home). I will say that I enjoyed the storyline of this show a little less than the previous time, but with it being very much a side dish to the music itself, it’s certainly not something I’d ever ding them for. You’ll still have fun with it and you’ll still get excited about the ending.

After leaving the stage, the band came back for an encore and slowed things down a little bit with “Cry For Me,” a personal favorite of mine, and then finished up with “Siren.” I stuck around for a while after the show ended and had a chance to talk to each of them for a little bit. Since I know you’re all wondering, I asked their bassist how hot it is in the mask he wears and he says it’s pretty bad, but that the leather jacket is actually way worse. Each of them, including The Rat Reaperess, were kind enough to sign my copy of Into the Realm and take a picture with me. We probably shot the breeze for about an hour, talking about their producer, their tour schedule, their favorite bands, all kinds of stuff. I’ve been fortunate to meet almost exclusively kind folks when it comes to the world of heavy music, but the folks from Castle Rat stand among the nicest I’ve met so far.

All in all, it was an amazing time, even if I knew a little bit of how things would go down. The setlist had a nice mix of old and new, the theatrics were fun and campy, and the energy in the room was immaculate, so I’ll reiterate what I said at the end of my review: Go see them live.