Wearily, we turn off our PlayStations, throw on some clothes and break free into the harsh outside world. Stumbling across the city, through the dense fog and rain, we finally arrive at the venue for tonight’s festivities: the aptly named The Haunt.
A sign hanging from the wall reads ‘Welcome to Silent Hill’, a chill would be shooting down our spines if it wasn’t for the collective body heat of 200 fans packed into the small venue. “This will be fantastic,” we think. “A chance to finally hear the devastating and haunting score from the Silent Hill video game series – played live.” We can barely contain our excitement.
We look back on ourselves in the heady few minutes before Akira Yamaoka’s band started to play with envy. Back then we were hopeful and full of optimism for the evening’s performance. Now, after enduring 90 minutes of the £25-a-ticket equivalent of your mate’s heavy rock covers band, we are reduced to a hardened, bitter shell of the person we used to be.
The Silent Hill series is one of highs and lows, with some games more revered than others. Silent Hill 2 in particular gathered high critical acclaim, and its score equally so. The music is ambient yet intense, adding to the suspense and eerie atmosphere of the game. Unfortunately, the only snippets of this famed soundtrack were bits of pre-recorded backing track, meaning that fans of this iconic score might as well have stayed at home playing the game.
Akira was joined by a selection of musicians who were all satisfactory at their respective instruments, yet the overall impression was of a soulless pub rock band churning out power chord after power chord. The singer, a young British woman named Karina Scuteri, was a mix between Evanescence’s Amy Lee and a rejected X Factor hopeful, over-performing and not exactly hitting all the right notes for the disappointed audience.
We spent much of the gig trying to figure out if we were alone in feeling let down by the performance. Our question was answered when a very intoxicated man, who mistook us for the gig’s organisers, spent 15 minutes telling the SOURCE his personal tale of woe.
“I’ve spent the whole week listening to the soundtracks,” he shouted, “But this is not Silent Hill. This is not what I came here to hear. This is shit.”
The Haunt, Friday 6th November 2015
Words by Jasmine Scott
