Live Review: Castle Rat and Unto Others at Belasco Theater, Los Angeles (2026)

Less of an Event, More of a Band

This was my second time seeing Castle Rat this year, and this time I brought a few friends who wanted to go just as much for Unto Others, a band I’ve followed since they were still called Idle Hands. It had been a while since I’d been to the Belasco in downtown LA. The building turns 100 this year, and in some ways it shows. It’s a little run down in spots, but it still has real majesty. It opened in 1926 as a playhouse for stage shows, and now it hosts bands from all over the world. It holds about 1,500 people and it was completely sold out. If the Belasco has upgraded anything, it’s the air conditioning. They blast it in that joint, and with that many bodies in the room I was grateful.

Wraith Knight opened: one man, great fantasy and medieval imagery, and half an hour of synths and keyboards, the kind of atmosphere music you’d put on before a raid in World of Warcraft. I respect the work very much, but I won’t lie to you: it got a little old after about 15 minutes. It felt like the world’s longest intro. Then came a 15-minute changeover, and that’s when it felt like the concert actually started.

Unto Others rule. I’ve seen them more than a few times under both names, and they still sound as good as ever. Mana from the Idle Hands days is one of my favorite albums of theirs, along with Strength. Gabriel Franco has a great voice that’s almost a mix between Elvis and Peter Steele from Type O Negative, and for a long time that voice was the main draw.

Now the rest of the band has really upped their game. Sebastian Silva keeps getting better, ripping solos across the board with huge stage presence, and Colin Vranizan was killing it behind the kit. “Give Me to the Night” is just a fantastic song that gets the energy way up in the room. “Jackie” is a crowd favorite and it was awesome. After the slow start, Unto Others picked up the gauntlet and, frankly, kicked a lot of ass. My only gripe: 11 songs was the right length for the main opener, but they closed on “No Children Laughing Now.” It’s a good song. Ending on “When Will God’s Work Be Done” or “Give Me to the Night” would have been epic.

The last time I saw Castle Rat was a one-off at House of Blues Anaheim, right after they’d been opening the AmonKlok tour. That show felt special to them, and you could tell. There was a costume contest, way more people dressed up, and a merch booth built on a castle wall with three to four times the merch and a banner to take pictures in front of. It felt like an event. The Belasco is a smaller room, and sold out it felt cramped. Less merch, fewer costumes. This felt more like a stop along a tour route. In May I wrote that they wouldn’t be playing rooms the size of House of Blues for much longer. Five months later I’m watching them in a room half that size. The difference is this is their own headlining run, and they sold it out.

That’s not a diss. Castle Rat rocked the room, maybe even more than in Anaheim. The production grew: more props, castle wall pieces, and a new backdrop of symbols somewhere between witchcraft and astrology. The story is more of the same. The Rat Reaperess kills the Rat Queen, there’s a battle, Riley Pinkerton pours fake blood out of her mouth, and the Queen is resurrected at the end. It’s still very cool to see live. No giant rat walking around this time. Instead they unfurled a long horizontal scroll showing the Castle Rat.

The flip side is new costumes, a unicorn, a serpent and others, worn by the same people working the merch booth.

New this time: a bass solo, a guitar solo and a drum solo spread through the set, and each one was really, really awesome. I loved the bass solo most, a fuzzy tone very reminiscent of Cliff Burton. “Wizard,” “Wolf I” and “Dragon” stood out, and “Siren” closed the encore. A buddy had to remind me how much they sound like Candlemass, and now I can’t unhear it. I’ve said before they might be an industry plant, and that may be true. But the music really is good, and it gives me hope for the metal world as a whole.

Anaheim felt like a celebration. The Belasco felt like a band coming into their own. I wonder how much longer they’ll be playing theaters before they pull a Ghost and start playing arenas, because I think they’re going to get that big. Whether you catch them on this tour or the next one, they are absolutely worth seeing.

Score: 8.5/10

Castle Rat Setlist

1. Phoenix I
2. Dagger Dagger
3. Wizard
4. Wolf I
5. Bass Solo
6. Feed the Dream
7. Unicorn
8. Path of Moss
9. Crystal Cave
10. Fresh Fur
11. Dragon
12. Drum Solo
13. Serpent

Encore:

14. Cry for Me
15. Siren

Unto Others Setlist

1. Over Western Shores
2. Give Me to the Night
3. Butterfly
4. Nightfall
5. Can You Hear the Rain
6. Jackie
7. It Doesn’t Really Matter
8. Heroin
9. When Will God’s Work Be Done
10. I Feel Nothing
11. No Children Laughing Now

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