Power Metal is the stuff of fantasies with Beast In Black, Sonata Arctica and Frozen Crown at O2 Forum Kentish Town. This is the Resurrection Tour 2026.
Beast In Black – Sonata Arctica – Frozen Crown
O2 Forum Kentish Town – 26 October 2026
Words: Lucy Dunnet
Photography: Manuela Langotsch
Italy’s coolest power Metal Band, Frozen Crown, warm the crowd’s fists and voices with a fun, if not slightly generic, batch of galloping riffs and epic plunders into fantastical lands. There is even a cover of The Goo Goo Dolls’ Iris, and while nothing can beat the original, the flourishing power riffs certainly put an unexpectedly enjoyable twist on the ’90s hit.
But it is when Sonata Arctica glide onto the stage that the night’s magic really begins. The Finnish Power Metal legends are celebrating 30 years as a band, and the O2 Forum Kentish Town is heaving with excitement.
Frontman Tony Kakko is on fine theatrical form, pulling a wild array of expressive faces as he weaves his whimsical melodies into the only too eager crowd, while guitarist Elias Viljanen cannot stop dabbing hand-horns and grinning.
“We have lots of songs about human relationships,” Tony says. “I’ve always found they’re more relatable because we have emotions.” Quite so, Tony, quite so! One of their faster love songs, Paid In Full, goes down a storm, with Henrik Klingenberg twinkling out enchanting melodies on his keyboards.
Tony proves to be quite the endearing waffler. “This next song a lot of babies were made to. So if you were born in the middle of 2002, and your mum and dad listened to the right kind of music.”
The soothing piano of Tallulah wafts in, and hopefully not too many unfortunate images of parents making babies. Tony laughs and clarifies he never did so himself (to this song) because “that would be fucking weird.” But even on Spotify, which came into existence many years after Tallulah was first released, it has over 10 million more streams than any other Sonata Arctica track.
They finish with an Oktoberfest-esque rowdy series of Tony bellowing “Is there something you need?” with the crowd bellowing back “VODKA!” It’s silly, it’s fun, and you really do feel like you’re helping to, as Sonata Arctica said, keep live music alive.
Beast In Black
The stage transforms into something straight out of a steampunk fantasy, with the drum kit raised onto a huge platform bottomed out by two massive fans. Fans that wield not just spinning blades but also light beams that wheel across the venue.
A synth-soaked rave buildup erupts, signalling it’s time to surrender to the spike-encrusted, hot-panted-up, glittering metal force that is Beast In Black.
Every song is a majestic leap into an alternate universe of fantastical love and conquests, and the fist pumps in the air and squeals of delighted singalong attempts attest to the joy swirling around the London crowd.
The night’s second set of Finnish Power Metal legends deliver a bombastic barrage of synchronised air poses, throaty harmonies and towering choruses. Frontman Yannis Papadopoulos is a creature unto himself, singing, roaring and rasping with a versatility that places him somewhere between human and mythic enchanter.
Meanwhile, Atte Palokangas is whipping out drum tosses straight from the circus every five seconds, and grinning from ear to ear like this is the best night of his life.
Yannis introduces new Beast In Black family member and guitarist, Markus Venehsalo, who launches into a guitar solo so scorching you would swear smoke was billowing off his fretboard. Oh wait, it is.
Hardcore, From Hell With Love, Sweet True Lies, Die By The Blade, it is almost impossible to pick one song that gets the crowd the most awe-struck, until Blind And Frozen jumps through the speakers and gets everyone bouncing. And singing.
These are the kind of songs that live rent-free in your head for days after, inspiring random melodic outbursts wherever you are.
“If this is the beginning of the tour, you guys are really setting us up for depression. I don’t know how much louder or better it can get,” Yannis teases, before listing many of the places they take their inspiration from, “Unpredictable things… smells… moments… places… maybe one day we can create something about London. But for this one it’s about a place that truly secured a place in our hearts: Tokyo!”
Who knows, maybe One Night In London will be the next Beast In Black single.
