Sabaton will make their return to North America in just under two weeks and specifically San Francisco on Saturday 10/12. They’ll be at the Regency Ballroom which is one of my usual haunts. They’ll be accompanied by power metal band Hammerfall.
If for whatever reason you’ve never heard of Sabaton, they are a band that sings about battles. Why battles? Because as Joakim once said long ago (and I’m paraphrasing), “if we’re going to sing about war, we might as well sing about real events.” To be clear, Sabaton should not be thought of glorifying war. It is more that these are things that should not be forgotten. To date they have mainly stuck the events of the past coming as recent as the Vietnam War. There’s been a few forays into the modern era as in Desert Storm but nothing closer than that. There will be plenty of stories to tell when that time comes and I’d be surprised if we didn’t see anything involving the horse soldiers of Task Force Dagger or the story of John Chapman amongst many others.
I’ve seen Sabaton in tiny venues like Thee Parkside and bigger ones like The Warfield and the UC Theater and they have never disappointed me. I’m looking forward to participating in the first-song ritual of “Ghost Divison.”
In April the band released a collaboration song between the video games World of Warships and Azur Lane called “Bismarck” which is about the titular German battleship Bismarck of World War II. The song was released as a standalone single.
Their latest album, The Great War, was released earlier this year in July. Check out my thoughts here.
As the tour is named “The Great Tour” expect a number of songs from this album plus many others from previous albums. Sabaton also has plenty of staple songs that it will be surprising to not hear 40:1, Night Witches, Shiroyama, Winged Hussars, Carolus Rex, or Primo Victoria.
If you’ve seen Sabaton you know what to expect. If you haven’t this is a great chance for you to see what everyone’s talking about. Sabaton’s live shows are high-energy affairs where everyone around you seems to know the words (and in many cases that’s accurate). You’ll be swept up by the emotion of the crowd. Learning about history accompanied by metal is as good a way to do things as I can think of. For the current generations who sometimes forget what has come before it’s to their benefit to listen to this band.
Here’s the full tour listing:
10/4 Ft. Lauderdale, FL – Revolution
10/5 Tampa, FL – Janus Landing
10/6 Atlanta, GA – Center Stage
10/8 Dallas, TX – House of Blues
10/10 Phoenix, AZ – Van Buren
10/11 Los Angeles, CA – The Wiltern
10/12 San Francisco, CA – The Regency Ballroom
10/14 Portland, OR – Roseland Ballroom
10/15 Seattle, WA – Showbox SoDo
10/16 Vancouver, BC – Vogue Theater
10/18 Edmonton, AB – Union Hall
10/19 Calgary, AB – The Palace Theater
10/21 Salt Lake City, UT – The Complex
10/23 Denver, CO – Ogden Theatre
10/25 Minneapolis, MN – Skyway Theater
10/26 Chicago, IL – The Vic Theatre
10/27 Cleveland, OH – The Agora Ballroom
10/29 Toronto, ON – The Danforth Music Hall
10/30 Montreal, QC – M Telus
11/1 Worcester, MA – Palladium
11/2 New York, NY – PlayStation Theater
11/3 Silver Spring, MD – The Fillmore
