Parkway Drive takes over the Zenith, Paris for its anniversary !

Thursday, October 2, 2025. The Zenith in Paris is packed to the rafters for this all-Australian lineup celebrating the 20-year career of the now legendary Parkway Drive. After performances by The Amity Affliction and Thy Art Is Murder, anticipation gradually builds in the pit. After a few (long) minutes of delay, the screens finally light up for a retrospective of the band's twenty years. Photos, videos, fragments of old concerts, a moment of nostalgia that satisfies old fans and new ones alike.

Then darkness falls over the venue. A beam of light sweeps across the stands, and Winston McCall appears at the top, white hood pulled tight over his head. Like a boxer entering the ring, he slowly descends the stairs, crosses the crowd, stops for selfies and a few hugs before reaching the B-stage in the center of the pit. The concert kicks off with the unbeatable Carrion. Flames shoot up to the beat of the drums and the audience is already cheering. The main stage remains veiled, with all attention focused on Winston for the moment.

With Prey, accompanied by strobe lights, the catwalk connects the B-stage to the main stage and the set is revealed, dancers and pyrotechnics appear, everything unfolds in a perfectly timed explosion. A few songs later, Boneyards offers a beautiful moment of complicity when Joel Birch (The Amity Affliction) joins Winston for a duet. With its saturated red light, the proximity makes the song almost tactile. The audience sings along, cheering the two men on and keeping time with the rhythm.

On Horizons, Winston moves from one stage to another throughout the song, while Jeff Ling rises on a platform surrounded by flames, like a central figure in a living tableau. Then comes Cemetery Bloom: the room darkens, rain falls around Winston, and the light plays with each drop. This is the kind of staging that you don't often see on the metal scene, which makes it all the more precious.

These few moments of calm precede Darker Still, where a string quartet takes to the stage. Electric riffs and violins intertwine, white light highlights each musician, and the stage becomes a hypnotic scene.

The drum solo follows. Ben Gordon rises in his rotating cage, which spins around. Flames, strobe lights, and the crowd's screams blend together as the concert reaches its climax. A few minutes of calm before the encore begins. Crushed rouses the pit, which chants the chorus in unison. Wild Eyes finally concludes the evening, accompanied by a cascade of flames and strobe lights, before the band takes a bow and warmly thanks the crowd.

Twenty years of Parkway Drive condensed into a show designed for the stage and the audience. Precise visuals, movement, pyrotechnics, strings, rain... each song found its own universe, and the audience was won over.

A big thank you to Live Nation for the invitation.