Sabaton is the kind of band that you either love or hate; some say that they’re an entry-level babby’s first band or full of cheese but others love them to death. I fall into that latter category and I can sing along with many of their songs with the best of them. Vocalist Joakim Broden once said (paraphrased) “If we’re going to sing about battles we might as well sing about real ones.” That’s actually one of the reasons why I like Sabaton as much as I do; they bring that reality into their music and in a way help educate people who would otherwise have never heard of some of the battles as important as they are. I’ve been listening to the band for over a decade at this point and I don’t think I’ll be stopping anytime soon.
Sabaton’s music has spanned the ancient era of Spartans to the jungles of Vietnam and beyond. Their latest album, “The Great War,” focuses upon World War I. Themes include the tank, chemical warfare, and aerial combat, all new elements of warfare in those days. There’s even the titular song Great War which asks “what’s so great about it?” It had been first assumed by Germany that the war would be over by Christmas 1914 but their forces bogged down and eventually, tens of countries were involved in the conflict. Trench warfare stalemated much of the fronts and while it was great in scale it was not great in any other sense of the word.
One of the things that made its debut on this tour is the tank drum riser. I had previously thought it too big to practically transport from venue to venue overseas and I’m glad I was wrong. They’re trucking the massive two-ton hunk of metal back and forth across North America and it surprised quite a lot of people when it was unveiled.
Tonight’s concert at San Francisco’s Regency Ballroom starts much like many concerts with the pulse-pounding Ghost Division featuring the Wehrmacht’s 7th Panzer Division. Leading with this song is the equivalent of going 0-60 MPH in two seconds flat. Almost every Sabaton concert I’ve gone to has started with this song and one problem I’ve always had is that I have to decide whether to shoot photos or headbang.
The single Bismarck, a collaboration between Sabaton, World of Warships, and Azur Lane, made its live debut during this tour. This is a song I was looking forward to ever since it was released online. Sabaton is no stranger to collaborations and they’ve lended the sound of other songs like Primo Victoria to other franchises in the past. Also making its debut on this tour is The Attack of the Dead Men which is one of the best songs off of “The Great War.”
The Lion From the North is a song that has caught on somewhat recently (well, within the last tour or two) and even though it comes from the same album as Carolus Rex was absent from sets for quite a while. I thought it was worthy of live performances back when the album was first released. I’m glad they’re playing it more often.
The final three songs would be Primo Victoria, Swedish Pagans, and To Hell and Back. Primo Victoria and Swedish Pagans are mainstays of any Sabaton show and To Hell and Back has cemented a place in the rotation as well.
The San Francisco show happened to coincide with San Francisco’s annual Fleet Week celebration and I saw at least a couple of US Marines show up. Had the show not sold out more than a week beforehand I think there would have been many more. It’s a pity that Devil Dogs wasn’t played because I think they woudl have gotten a kick out of that but I did see them sing along to Bismarck.
This was a great setlist, but to be honest, it’s hard to make a bad setlist out of Sabaton songs. They’ve had so many albums with so many good songs that you could almost throw darts one by one at their catalogue and make a good setlist.
Old staples like Primo Victoria, Ghost Division, Swedish Pagans, and Carolus Rex are met with newer songs like Shiroyama, Night Witches, and The Last Stand not to mention all the songs from the newest album. I think The Attack of the Dead Men will remain on many of Sabaton’s sets to come. We are missing classics like the everpresent 40:1 and Art of War but there’s only so many songs you can put in a set.
One of Sabaton’s greatest strengths is writing catchy lyrics and pairing it with a good musical accompaniment. Joakim’s bombastic voice is one of the main driving forces of Sabaton’s music and it would be hard to imagine the band without him. Paired with founding bassist Par Sundstrom they make for a great duo and almost all of the writing duties have been carried out by the two over the fifteen years of existence. You know you’ve done something right when almost every concert has sold out before the tour has even begun and it feels like everyone knows the words to each song. Sabaton fans are very dedicated and the band has hit meteoric heights. I still remember that one time they played at Thee Parkside back in 2013. I think my living room is about the same size as Thee Parkside, and my living room is not big by far.
It’s a little early to say this but I’m looking forward to their next album and the next time they arrive in San Francisco.
Setlist:
Ghost Division
Great War
Resist and Bite
Fields of Verdun
The Attack of the Dead Men
The Red Baron
The Price of a Mile
Bismarck
The Lion From the North
Carolus Rex
Shiroyama
Night Witches
The Lost Battalion
The Last Stand
82nd All the Way
Encore:
Primo Victoria
Swedish Pagans
To Hell and Back
The Great Tour – US Leg
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