A Tuesday night in Worcester, Massachusetts doesn’t seem like the time or place for a fantasy world to come to life, but there was magic to be found at the Palladium when Castle Rat came to town last week.

Born in Brooklyn and cutting their teeth at Saint Vitus, a club with just as much hipster cache as metal cred, Castle Rat has quickly become something of a metal phenomenon. Touring in support of The Bestiary, their exceptional second album from last year, the band has been garnering bigger and bigger audiences on the reputation of its live show. With each member of the band taking on a character—lead singer and guitarist Riley Pinkerton (pictured above) as The Rat Queen, guitarist Franco Vittore (pictured below) as The Count, bassist Charley Ruddell as The Plague Doctor, and drummer Josh Strmic as The All-Seeing Druid—to do battle with the evil Rat Reapress, the stage show is like a Terry Brooks novel come to life and set to a doom metal soundtrack of the highest order.

Of course, it doesn’t hurt that leading this D&D nerd fantasy is a gorgeous woman in skimpy chainmail. But Pinkerton isn’t just a pretty face in warpaint. She’s the mastermind behind Castle Rat, and it’s doubtful anyone would care if the music wasn’t up to snuff. Pinkerton has no doubt spent time studying the classics—Sabbath, Maiden, et. al—and it shows in the band’s potent combination of gothic atmospherics and catchy, doom-laden hooks.

Pinkerton and Castle Rat worked their way through a set that included most of The Bestiary, as well as several tracks from their debut, Into the Realm, while also acting out a loose narrative about The Count being turned into a vampire with no soul for the Rat Reapress to reap, who then slayed the Rat Queen in retaliation. (Where was security?) Fortunately, Riley was brought back to life with a potion administered by the Druid in time for a riveting ending to the set (“Serpent”) and a subsequent encore with an even bigger climax in “Siren” from the latest album.

In between the theatrics, there were plenty of standard metal tropes, namely guitar and drum solos. But in the hands of these wizards, none of it seemed cliché. Instead, this was a celebration of the dark magic of metal in which the audience members, many of whom were draped in cloaks or similar attire, were included. With Blue Öyster Cult’s “(Don’t Fear) The Reaper” playing over the PA as the band and cast members took their bows, it was hard not to feel like this was so much more than just another rock show.