Live Evil: Beyond Creation’s Simon Girard on Craziest Show, Dream Show and More

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Canadian technical death-metal crew Beyond Creation have been shredding out forward-thinking extreme music for nearly 15 years and have played all sorts of concerts over that time — big, small, good, bad and ugly. The band has a slew of dates lined up for the coming months, including gigs in South America and Australia, in support of its stellar third album, Algorythm, released last year via Season of Mist. Ahead of those shows, we talked to singer-guitarist Simon Girard about his band’s first, worst, best and most insane gigs.

What was Beyond Creation’s first show?
Simon Girard The first show was in 2010 — before we released our demo — in a Montreal venue called L’inconditionnel, which doesn’t exist anymore. It was a pretty fun show, lots of friends as well as our family. Some members of the headlining band  — a small local band, which we never heard of again afterwards — was laughing at us when we entered the venue because we didn’t have any bassist at the time. When we started playing, they saw this huge mosh pit that kept going during our entire set and we could  see in their faces that they were not expecting this vibe at all! [Laughs]

What was your worst show?
During one of our tours in Mexico, there was that one show where the stage power was shutting down every 20 seconds. The house techs were trying to solve the problem, but they had trouble understanding our sound guy and us. It was just a big mess. [Laughs] We ended up playing a 45-minute set in about one hour 15. But the crowd was very nice and comprehensive. It was really just the technical problems that were so annoying and destabilizing!

How about your craziest?
One that stands out for me was the Heavy Montreal Festival in 2015. We were playing on a sick stage, in the middle of a forest, in front of few thousands fans. People were so hyped — they were climbing the trees to jump in the mosh pit! It was unreal ! What a good feeling to be playing in nature in front of a crazy audience!

What was the smallest gig you ever played?
The smallest show we did was in a bar somewhere in Arizona in 2014, but I can’t remember exactly where it was. The show that was initially booked had been cancelled only a few days before getting there because they shut down the venue … so within three days of notice, we got the opportunity to play in that bar, in the middle of the desert. It turned out that there was us, the bartenders and five people including the two regulars! [Laughs]

And the biggest one you’ve played?
The biggest show we played was definitely the Hellfest in France. We had a crazy good time and the vibe was unreal ! I can’t really tell the numbers, but somewhere between 10 to 15 thousands people.

What would be your dream show?
We lived our dream show a couple of times, [laughs] the last time being our album release show for Algorythm in Montreal at this venue called Le National. There was so much energy and a sick vibe, playing our entire new album in front of our friends, family, new and longtime fans. But regarding a show that never happened, I think it would be playing with Slipknot. I’ve been listening to this band since my young age and love them, but I unfortunately never had the chance to see them live. It would be a double-win situation. [Laughs]