Photos and a review of Three Days Grace and Volbeat in Ottawa

[Ross MacDonald and Karen Coughtrey were on another mission for us. – AC]

If you wanted to get summer off to a rocking start, the Canadian Tire Centre in Ottawa was the place to be Sunday night (July 22, 2025) as co-headliners Three Days Grace and Volbeat brought their tour, with opener Wage War to town.

American metal band Wage War went on first, and in one of the biggest compliments a band could receive, the majority of the crowd were already in attendance.

Wage War’s music is undoubtedly hard core metal but beneath the tough exterior was hints of something softer with beautiful recorded instrumental interludes between numbers and popular-like undertones or highlights in some songs.

The crowd’s early arrival was one hint, but the fact Wage War would play a full ten song set was also a clear indication that this was a popular and established band making the night practically a triple bill.

They bookended the set with music off their newest album, Stigma (released 2024) including opening with ‘Nail5’ and winding down the set with ‘Happy Hunting’ and ‘Magnetic’. In between they played ‘Low’ and ‘Stitch’ off their earlier albums and to close out they played the title track, ‘Manic’ of their 2021 pandemic-era album.

Denmark’s Volbeat was next and they took the stage to a normal array of dramatic noise but among it, the sound of a goat bleating. Strange only if one is not aware that the title of the band’s newest album is titled, God Of Angels Trust.

The stage backdrop (and album cover) depicts a goat in a bedroom and lead Michael Poulsen, after playing the goat song mid-set, would introduce the crowd to Thor, a good goat. The song, not actually called the goat song, has a mouthful of a title and is properly referred to by ‘In The Barn Of The Goat Giving Birth To Satan’s Spawn In A Dying World Of Doom’.

Volbeat was memorable and they played other songs off the new album including ‘By A Monster’s Hand’ and ‘Demonic Depression’ but Volbeat had much more to offer. They opened with older songs ‘Warriors Call’, ‘Pool of Booze, Booze, Booza’, ‘Lola Montez’, and ‘Devil’s Bleeding Crowd’. Although ‘Warriors Call’ got the crowd back into high gear after the short break, it was ‘Lola Montez’ that got the whole arena singing along. And like Wage War they are a hard-edged band but the set would demonstrate there was a softer side hiding underneath the tough metal rock exterior.

Poulsen’s musical influences are vast and varied and they include the legendary Johnny Cash (a respect they may share with Wage War who also have a song titled after the country rockabilly legend.) Volbeat tested the crowd’s Johnny Cash knowledge with ‘Ring of Fire’ before playing their 2007 song ‘Sad Man’s Tongue’ on which the Johnny Cash influence and inspiration is unmistakable as it’s modelled after his classic ‘Folsom Prison Blues’.

Other rounder edges of the set (the ones when the flashlights come on) were when they dedicated the 2010 song ‘Fallen’ to anyone who has lost someone, and near the end of the set when they dedicated ‘For Evigt’ (off their 2016 album) to life itself (after mentioning they have wives and children at home in Denmark.)

They would close with another older favourite ‘Still Counting.’

Headliners, Canadian band, Three Days Grace were later to the stage than scheduled but they didn’t deny the crowd any of the planned performance and saved the audience from the usual encore charade. Even so, the crowd spent plenty of time chanting the band’s name, doing so between nearly every song.

As original lead singer, Adam Gontier, rejoined the band in 2024, he and Matt Walst would share lead singer duties meaning the set list bounced around between album eras. They opened with ‘Animal I Have Become’ (2006) followed by ‘So Called Life’ (2022).

By the time they started their third song, the hard-hitting hit ‘Break’, the general admission area in front of the stage had started moshing and crowd-surfing. It was a night where Ottawa lost its moniker as a sleepy government town.

This tour is a three country tour (the three home countries of the three bands) and Three Days Grace expressed gratitude to be back in Canada before playing ‘Home’. They would also share the story of the band (for those unaware of the lead singer situation) and how the band has climbed a metaphorical mountain before playing, you guessed it, ‘The Mountain’.

Of course they played music off the new album, Alienation, dropping in August. They thanked the crowd for already making ‘Apologies’, released a mere three weeks ago, a top 3 song in the country. They also played ‘May Day’ off the upcoming album. They would bounce from these brand new songs to some of their oldest songs ‘I Hate Everything About You’ and ‘Just Like You’. They would also play the first song Matt Walst ever did with the band, ‘Pain Killer’.

Like the other two bands, Three Days Grace is first and foremost a rock band but they couldn’t help but show a softer side and did so with an Adam Gontier alone on stage, singing a cover of Alice in Chains’ ‘Rooster’. And later, after sharing that they’ve learned their music has helped many people through tough times, the flashlights were lit up for ‘Never Too Late’.

They would end the night on the sweetest of notes with Brad Walst’s adult son James (on guitar) and Matt Walst’s little son joining them on stage for the night’s finale ‘Riot’.

Three Days Grace
Adam Gontier – vocals, rhythm guitar
Neil Sanderson – drums, backing vocals, keyboards
Brad Walst – bass, backing vocals
Barry Stock – lead guitar
Matt Walst – vocals, rhythm guitar

Volbeat
Michael Poulsen – lead vocals, rhythm guitar
Jon Larsen – drums
Kaspar Boye Larsen – bass, backing vocals
Flemming C. Lund – lead guitar, backing vocals

Wage War
Briton Bond – lead vocals , guitar
Seth Blake – lead guitar, backing vocals
Cody Quistad – rhythm guitar
Chris Gaylord – bass, backing vocals
Stephen Kluesener – drums