Wolves Slade Rooms is a great little venue, brilliant concept, and lovely bar! It's the night after the night before, as I've already seen Sabaton destroy London's Electric Ballroom with a packed out show, and it's also the Friday night before 'Tailz in Wolverhampton. I'm on a flipping roll!

In direct contrast to the night before, tonight is still sold out, but slightly roomier, so I've got the chance to get right up to the front. A good job too as sadly the stage isn't raised quite so high in this establishment making it difficult to get a good view of the band from anywhere but the front couple of rows.  Alestorm open up the evening, but for me, nowadays they are a one joke band whose time has really come. Their one good song 'Wolves of the Sea' is a cover of the Latvian Eurovision entry from a couple of years ago, otherwise its all pretty pointless. The band doesn't even bother wearing the pirate get up anymore. Surely that would at least bring some genuine colour to the set? I reckon it's time for the band to either rename themselves or give up the Jolly Roger. Still there was plenty of naff Captain Jack wannabes in the audience...bless!

Sabaton are in a different league altogether, whether they have a ridiculous twenty minutes on Sonisphere stage two or the full headline nine yards, as here tonight, they always deliver a top performance! They have developed a highly polished sound, and production. They also seem to be enjoying every minute, all the time, wherever they are in the world. 'Ghost Division' starts the panzers rolling, and we then surrender to '40-1', and every one of us shows respect to the spirit of Spartans for those brave enough to make the stand against all odds. The tanks roll on with 'Screaming Eagles' from the new album and the hits keep coming with 'Atero Dominatus' taking us to the beaches of D-Day.

Hard work touring the festivals recently has bred familiarity with the Sabaton name, and a strong following of fans knowing every word is the result. Maybe blowing Dragonforce away every night last year also helped, but it means Sabaton can do no wrong on this their own tour.  An interesting choice was up next with 'Final Solution'. Enjoying a night out, whilst listening to a song about the Holocaust doesn't exactly go hand in hand, but this is a song the fans had apparently demanded. So, be it...and it goes down a storm. 'Uprising' (incidentally my fave from the new 'Coat of Arms' album) is additionally a brilliant follow on to '40-1', and a new hit single in the making. (NB: The video is especially good, and put production values in some of the heavy metal market leaders videos to shame. Check it out on Youtube)

Really its simple formula Sabaton have going on here. Here's a song about a local battle, where you locals fought rather well. Hurrah! So we get the Falklands themed 'Back in Control' (which I doubt that goes down well in Buenos Aires), followed by 'Wolfpack'.  Classic line of the night goes to "hey, we're going to mix up the set right now, and play a different song, don't worry it's still about war", this has us rolling in the aisles. Sabaton have certainly made an art form of this, but its not just that, it's also about the tongue in cheek humour, which translates very well with the audience. Old favourite 'Primo Victoria' has the crowd bouncing and shaking the foundations of the Slade Rooms, and even Noddy Holder would be proud.

With Joakim Broden's trademark combats wardrobe suffering a malfunction, we're promised more of his 'Metal Machine', but thankfully unlike Graspop this year, his own metal machine at least remains hidden.  Through my back-to-back live encounters with the band it's easy to see why Sabaton has such a winning familiarity with the audiences here in the UK, they have a humour reminiscent of seaside novelty postcards that travels well.  Why on earth they only got 20 minutes at Sonisphere UK earlier this year is beyond me, but mark my words much greater things are waiting for the boys from Sabaton.

To quote one Mr Churchill...."ohh yes!"