Exodus Exits

This past Friday night, I took my Little and three other people to the Exodus in Peril concert at my church. It was the second "Metal for Missions" concert that they have held, raising money for our upcoming missions trip to Honduras for the kids there with Compassion Canada. There were five opening bands and then the night was capped up with the headline band, Exodus.

Calvin, the lead singer, came up to me when I first arrived while I was standing alone. He told me that this was Exodus' final show and that they were disbanding. Crazy! I had to keep that minor bit of news to myself until they announced in partway through their set at the end of the night.

When they did make the announcement, the crowd was in disbelief. Up to that point, the crowd seemed somewhat lazy to me. The energy was lacking and the moshpit wasn't nearly as active as past shows. After the announcement, the entire crowd became this spastic monster. Everyone realized that this was their last chance to rock out with Exodus. The mosh pit went into high gear, people started crowd surfing all over the place and towards the end, the crowd almost overran the stage. Some people were jumping on the band members themselves and at one point I saw Calvin walk around with a guy clinging to his back while he kept singing. Much better!

Terribly sad to see them go. They have really developed a young fan base here in London. My Little and his brother both became fans and every kid that I brought to a show walked away amazed to learn how cool Christians can be. Nothing like a little heavy metal to bring out the love, eh?

Exodus' official MySpace site has a ton of comments from fans. Amy, Calvin's girlfriend, has a bunch of photos up from the evening, and even a video. We'll miss you guys!