Saturday, April 25, 2026. It’s been over 30 years since Lamb of God came screaming onto the metal scene, and they were back once again to shake us to our core in Uncasville, Connecticut, with a star-studded lineup on the Into Oblivion tour. The gloomy, rainy night at Mohegan Sun Arena set the scene for what was to be a night of the heaviest, face-melting metal you could imagine.
First onto the stage was a band that many may not know or, to be fair, cannot even pronounce. Sanguisuggabogg, the brutal death metal outfit from Columbus, Ohio, came out to warm up the crowd around 7 p.m. and get the circle pit spinning. To many of their fans, they are known simply as “The Bogg,” a great description of what they feel like.
Corey Davidson’s guttural vocals make you feel like you are moving through a muddy bog with every chug from Drew Arnold’s guitar pushing back against you. Maybe the stage prop of a bloody corpse behind them didn’t send you a message. When Davidson screamed “If you are standing still, you’re a target,” maybe that told you you’d be fighting for your life in that pit.
Next up on the card was Fit For an Autopsy, a well-renowned name in the world of deathcore. They came out swinging and wanted the crowd to do the same with their song “Lower Purpose.”
Autopsy is known for its mix of growling vocals and soaring guitar melodies that balance each other out perfectly, and that tension brought them to life on stage. Guitarist Pat Sheridan spun us around with his arpeggiated riffs from his hot pink guitar on songs like “Hostage” and “Warfare” that were sure to make you a fan if you weren’t before.
Then came the boys hailing from Sherman, Texas, who I felt could have been the headliner of the show with the performance they put on. Kublai Khan is a newer name to the hardcore scene, but they are making waves. Their logo was seen strewn across the shirts of many people throughout the arena, including myself, showing just how popular they have gotten over just the past few years.
Their song “Theory of Mind” blew up on social media in 2023 and it has only been up from there, bringing the hardcore genre back up with them. Kublai Khan’s first three songs set the mood: crushing guitar riffs in “Darwinism” (with help on vocals from Lamb of God’s Randy Blythe), “Supreme Ruler” and “Low Tech” were getting us ready for carnage.
Kublai Khan played for about 45 minutes and maintained complete control of the crowd at all times. When frontman Matt Honeycutt would stop his signature vocals and open the mic to the crowd, they would sing the words, and when he said to open the pit, it opened. Kublai Khan’s set rocked us to the core with every song and made it one we would never forget. Khan truly does mean “king.”
Last but not least were the legends of heavy metal themselves, Lamb of God. There’s no frontman more energetic than Randy Blythe, and nobody but him could get a crowd more alive after surviving through three of the heaviest sets known to man. Lamb of God kept the setlist fresh and interesting, playing all their classic hits like “Walk With Me in Hell” and “Laid to Rest,” while throwing in some newer tracks off “Into Oblivion,” their 12th studio album, which was released this year.
Lamb of God’s stage setup was awesome, to say the least. A mesmerizing array of screens behind them was lined with giant skulls and pulsating lasers that made you feel immersed in songs like “Resurrection Man.” Visually, they were stunning, and you could feel the music too. The abrupt start of “Parasocial Christ” shook Mohegan Sun like an earthquake; the chugging riffs of Mark Morton and Willie Adler could be felt in your chest.
The night felt like an all-out war with only a brief second to breathe during a beautifully soft guitar duel in the middle of the set. Nonetheless, Lamb of God kept the crowd going until the very end with their closing song, “Redneck,” so much so that the metalheads in the circle pit decided to take their shirts off for the finale to show how alive they were.
Overall, every opening band was stellar in this show, and it was a treat to cap it all off with Lamb of God. It feels like the tour’s lineup was a passing of the torch for the metal genre. With Lamb of God reaching three decades as a band, it was great to see them bring on the new faces of metal to take the stage and showcase the future.
