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Rotterdam Market Hall

Lof der Zoetheid

This new cafe by mother-daughter team Elena and Anastasia de Ruyter opened today. It's located on Noordplein 1 in the north part of Rotterdam with a beautiful view of the Rotte, the old Heineken brewery and Noordplein.

We had lunch there, consisting of small, fresh-baked rolls and condiments that you can assemble yourself. Eva had the nettle-cheese with tomato-chili jam and I had smoked mackerel rillettes with pickles. Very yummy. For dessert we ordered a scone with clotted cream and homemade jam and a piece of heavenly chocolate-truffle cake.

Lof der Zoetheid is open on friday, saturday and sunday from 10:00 - 17:30. http://lofderzoetheid.com/

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El Pino & the Volunteers

Hofplein

From here it almost looks like Rotterdam is a big city.

Green Day at Ahoy II

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KOC

Sail Away

Lufthansa

De service op de korte vlucht van Rotterdam naar München en terug was echt super. Je doet 1,5 uur over 800km en je krijgt een lekkere sandwich en een biertje op 10.000m hoogte. Dat kan geen trein. 

An awesome Sunday in Rotterdam

Yesterday I went to see Throwdown, Unearth and Chimaira in Watt, Rotterdam (NL). The show started early (Daath opened the show at 4PM) and it took me about an hour to get there, so I had to get up way too early in my opinion. Sundays are for sleeping in and hanging on the couch all day. Besides, I was still a bit hungover from partying too hard at my best friends birthday party.

So I grabbed a can of Monster Energy, took the train to Rotterdam around 2:30PM, met with Guyon (drummer for For Blood And Vengeance) somewhere halfway, and we arrived at Rotterdam about an hour later. Even though the doors opened at 3PM, there was still a line half an hour later. This was because the people at the wardrobe weren't very fast. From what I saw, nobody works pretty fast in Rotterdam...

Anyway, we got in, just in time to see the start of the Daath show. Not really my kind of style. And what really annoyed me was that the solo sound of both guitarists was way louder than their usual sound. I saw people around me standing with their ears covered every time a solo started. Luckily I always wear my earplugs during concerts. At the end of the show even the sound engineer had enough of it, so every time there was a solo, he manually turned down the volume.

After the Daath show, we decided to get more to the front of the room, so we could hear and see Throwdown better. They kicked ass! I really love their almost southern rock style of metal. And the new songs were awesome! Their new album "Deathless" comes out in November and I can't wait to hear it! And I hope they'll return to Holland next year to play more songs off of that record.

Next up was Unearth. I've seen them once before in Eindhoven, supporting Hatebreed. To be honest, I liked their show back then better. But this one wasn't bad at all. I always enjoy the way they have fun on stage. Those guys are really insane, especially the guitarists! They really crack me up! Too bad I couldn't hear them too well, because we were standing in front of the stage, right under the PA system. Luckily I know the songs pretty well, so I could still recognize most of it.

Chimaira was the headliner of the show. Mark Hunter, the singer, was still kind of hungover from the party the night before, but his performance was good. That's what a professional should be like. Because we couldn't hear Unearth too well, we decided to move to the center of the room, just in front of the sound engineer. We could hear the music way better there. Chimaira's show was nice. They were better when I saw them in Utrecht a few years ago, though. Drummer Andols had a hard time to keep things tight and Matt DeVries wasn't present because he and his wife just had a baby (congrats!). He was replaced by one of the guitarists from Daath, who did a really good job! So even though Chimaira wasn't as good as the last time I saw them, I still enjoyed their show very much.

All in all it was an awesome day, saw three of my favorite bands and had a good time together with our drummer. Too bad the rest of my band couldn't make it. They really missed some nice shows. However, next time I'd like to see these bands in Melkweg, Amsterdam or even Paradiso, Amsterdam. Those venues have way better acoustics and I definitely prefer Amsterdam over Rotterdam! So here a tip for Watt, Rotterdam: get your sound fixed! I'd like to hear more guitars and less drums next time. Fix that and I'll enjoy the evening even more!

Follow the bands in this blog on Twitter:
Throwdown: www.twitter.com/throwdown
Unearth: www.twitter.com/unearthofficial
Chimaira: www.twitter.com/chimairaband
Hatebreed: www.twitter.com/hatebreed
For Blood And Vengeance: www.twitter.com/FBAV

Rotterdam Graffiti Photos