Venue: Singapore Indoor Stadium, Singapore
Date: 13th October 2026
Promoter: Midas Promotions
Review by: Nate Eileen Tjoeng
Special Thanks: The Midas Promotions and Velvet Hammer teams
Photos by Alvin Ho
Eleven Years Avenged
Avenged Sevenfold Asia Tour Singapore
The 27-year-old Californian heavy metal band thundered back to our sunny (and currently hazy) shores, and fans would have wanted it no other way. It’s been over a decade since the glam quintet rocked The Coliseum at the Hard Rock Hotel in 2015 on the Hail to the King Asian tour. Across their last two albums, The Stage (2016) and Life Is But a Dream… (2023), the band focused heavily on North American and European runs and never returned to Southeast Asia until this year.
When Avenged Sevenfold (A7X) announced their Asia Tour 2026, the Deathbats, as fans call themselves, snapped up tickets, nostalgia already running high, eager to hear how their favourite band’s sound had evolved over the last two albums. The latest album especially shows a move toward jazz and a Daft Punk-style vocoder, drawing a sharp distinction from their early sound.
Despite this shift in musicality, which some longtime fans trace back to the band’s restlessness after losing The Rev (the original drummer) in 2009, A7X has enjoyed resounding loyalty from its fan base. Sold-out shows across the current tour testify to that. This may be because their setlists still feature the iconic favourites from their early albums. That was reassuring, given the odds which included M. Shadows’ vocal injury, which was diagnosed as a vocal fold hematoma. The frontman’s inability to belt and scream forced the band to postpone their Latin American tour.
Thousands of metalheads showed up at the Indoor Stadium, many dressed ready for the show. The crowd bought merchandise from booths open since 3pm, which gave some fans more time in line than the band would spend on stage, and donned tour T-shirts, ready for the night.
Promptly at 7.30pm, the stage lights came on and a small figure stepped on stage. Belying her age and slight frame, the guest opener easily earned herself the title of the biggest voice and coolest girl in the room the moment she started performing. She was none other than the America’s Got Talent winner, Nene Royal. Picked by the band to open their Singapore show, she was living a second dream in as many months: opening for her all-time favourite band, as she revealed on stage.
Her stage presence enraptured the audience, despite her being all alone with her electric guitar. She quickly convinced every single person in the crowd why she deserved to be there. She opened by shredding through Muse’s Hysteria and wowed the crowd with a powerful voice beyond her years. Even though her set was only 30 minutes, she chose rock and metal favourites such as Killing in the Name by Rage Against the Machine and I-E-A-I-A-I-O by System of a Down, which kept the audience riveted. To end her set, she gave the crowd a live rendition of the song that crowned her – The Cranberries’ Zombie.
Nene had warmed the crowd up with her heavy guitar distortion, and the stadium waited with bated breath for the highlight of the night. After half an hour, their 11-year wait ended. Songs from the band’s latest EP, released under the alter ego Statica, were played from tape as an introduction to the show, then came the chilling chime of Nightmare. The audience roared when Synyster Gates’ guitar blasted through the hall as the band revealed themselves. From the first riff, it was clear that A7X had not aged a day. The stadium echoed “Your f**king nightmare” several times, proving the Deathbats hadn’t forgotten how to rock with them all these years.
What has always set A7X apart from their peers in the metal league is that they never really looked like a band. Each worthy of being a pin-up on his own, they looked like five separate headliners who happened to share a stage. Back in the mid-2000s, metal purists sneered at the pretty boys – the eyeliner, painted black nails, dress shirts with vests and bow ties – and dismissed them as posers playing dress-up. Two decades on, the look is no longer the point of contention. Synyster Gates remains the band’s resident guitar hero, even in a casual singlet, baggy pants and sneakers. Zacky Vengeance, inked from neck to knuckle and owner of his own clothing label, knows that his best get-up is no shirt at all. Johnny Christ donned a baggy, dark grey T-shirt and swung his bass around as his only accessory. M. Shadows walked the stage without any fancy apparel and occasionally had his shades on, knowing that the music was all that mattered. Brooks Wackerman, perched on a riser behind the band, made his Singapore debut with A7X that night. The veteran of Bad Religion and Suicidal Tendencies looked as unassuming as ever and took a literal backseat as the band’s original members strutted the stage.
The setlist drew from across their catalogue. Unmissable classics like Afterlife, Hail to the King, Bat Country and Unholy Confessions gave the Deathbats exactly what they came for, while the band also made room for songs Singapore had never heard live, such as The Stage and Game Over, along with Nobody and Cosmic, which was played as the encore.
Gates was, as ever, the axis everything turned on. His riffs were as precise as on record, and his fingers glided across the fretboard in cascading arpeggios so effortlessly that it was easy to forget how hard this music is to play. Christ and Vengeance were less showy than in their younger days, but their cool demeanour never departed. They didn’t need to prowl the stage to command it. All three share something no session player could fake: a chemistry built over a quarter of a century, the kind that is simply irreplaceable. Like a ritual, Gates and Vengeance stood side by side several times as they played their parts on guitar. The left- and right-handed guitar maestros knew this picture-perfect moment was one they couldn’t deprive their fans of.
How about the voice? Shadows’ tone and pitch were intact, raspy and full-throated, with no sign of damage. He screamed effortlessly, without missing a note. Some in the crowd might have wondered whether this tour was worth the risk, since he had gone silent a year ago to let his vocal cords heal. He was probably singing smart, choosing songs that wouldn’t push him over the edge. Perhaps that is why Seize the Day, with its punishing high notes, didn’t make the cut.
As is tradition, So Far Away was dedicated to The Rev. Phones lit up across the stadium in solidarity as everyone remembered the fallen drummer who was integral to the band’s success. The Rev’s presence was felt beyond that one song – Afterlife, Buried Alive and A Little Piece of Heaven, all songs he wrote, were part of the set.
For the most part, Wackerman held down the backbeat, but the band knew better than to leave him out. As a moment of glory, they gave him a couple of minutes to hammer away unaccompanied, at his elaborate kit of two bass drums and a forest of toms, snares and hi-hats. His dexterity and power showed everyone in the stadium why the band chose him. His thundering double-kick work was a fitting homage to the original drummer whose style shaped so many of their songs.
Later into the night, Shadows interrupted the flow by candidly asking both the band and the audience, “How about we do something a little different tonight?”
“Shall we bring Nene back on stage?”
The audience roared, eager to see what came next. Nene Royal walked out looking more ready than ever, though Shadows admitted it was completely unrehearsed. On the big screens, we watched Shadows whisper something to her, and she nodded innocently. Before long, she was shredding her guitar and filling in Shadows’ vocal parts impeccably on Bat Country and Unholy Confessions. She could have passed for a sixth member. Nothing was amiss; this was a fan who had done her homework, and everyone present was blown away.
Having Nene play with A7X was a surprise the crowd hadn’t bargained for, and it gave them more than their money’s worth. Hundreds of phone cameras caught the moment, and she was propelled to local fame the very next day. The Straits Times and Mothership, which seldom cover metal, raved on Instagram about the girl’s incredible performance. For the 16-year-old who thought her dream was fulfilled when she opened for her favourite band, sharing the stage with her heroes must have felt like heaven. The band, naturally, had a little piece of it ready.
With the euphoria still in the air, A7X turned to something “darker”. They launched into A Little Piece of Heaven, the theatrical favourite everyone came for. The macabre singalong is always a riot, with the crowd chanting lyrics from The Rev’s part – “Eat it, eat it, eat it!”
The band closed the night with Cosmic, a 7 and a ½ minute epic from their latest album that gave Wackerman and Gates one last chance to show off, while Shadows ran his voice through a vocoder for its spacey finale.
It was a curious way to say goodbye – not with a headbanger nor a singalong, but with a slow, pensive number that let the crowd listen rather than shout. Perhaps that was intentional. Avenged Sevenfold gave Singapore everything it had waited eleven years for: the anthems, a frontman who sounded nothing like a man whose vocal cords went through hell, a tribute to the friend they lost, and a 16-year-old’s dream coming true before our eyes. Then they left us with a reminder that they are evolving while retaining their identity. Their music has carried them through pain, loss, celebrations, and happiness, and they hope to bring Deathbats along as they move forward.
As thousands spilled out of the Indoor Stadium into the haze, one thing was certain: the long wait had finally been avenged. Let’s hope that the next one won’t take another eleven years.