In the same week that AC/DC performed with Axl Rose at Manchester City's Etihad Stadium, US Hardcore legends ACxDC played Rebellion Manchester with a whopping 9 bands in support from all over the UK. With the price of only £7 for 10 bands, I feel like I underpaid to see so many fine quality bands. In contrast it would probably have cost 10 times this amount to see the real AC/DC!
Many people in the Extreme Metal scene and perhaps beyond will certainly have heard of the Temples Festival incident. Temples Festival was due to be running at the exact same time in Bristol, but was abruptly cancelled less than a week before it even began! Not only did this leave gig goers potentially with transport tickets and booked hotels that they were unable to get refunded at such short notice, but a lot of bands travelling from all over the world were left without a major platform to showcase their music. I'm not going to go too much into how it all happened, but thankfully promoters all across Britain worked their socks off night and day to make sure the majority of the touring bands had new gigs to play. Musicians in the underground music scene do not earn a comfortable living, and so the loss of playing at a packed out Festival could have been catastrophic. It was such a sight to see the Metal community pull together, with promoters and bands working tirelessly together to make sure all these bands had a stage to play on. And I hear that most of the travelling bands indeed got sorted in the end, even if it was a complete last minute job.
Winds of Genocide and Geist were both added to this bill at the zero hour. The show was originally billed to take place at the nearby Retro Bar, but ended up taking place at Rebellion after two different promoters pulled together to make the best of a bad situation. But anyway that's enough backstory, here's how the bands got on...
Don't be too alarmed by their band name, as apparently it just means the band like to drink loads of Pivo Beer... Okay some alarm may be required! Pivorapist opened a fast and furious all-dayer in style. Self described as a Porno/Goregrind band, this automatically makes them a love it or hate it kind of act. Their music is obviously very tongue in cheek and those who have a very sick sense of humour will probably already own their entire discography!
Rebellion saw a strong crowd pouring in from the very start as Pivorapist shred through a set of one dimensional Death-Grind with a mixture of pig grunting vocals and growls that sounded like the lead vocalist was trying to regurgitate his breakfast! Their songs were all kind of a blur with very little variety, but the performance itself had a lot of passion and some mild intensity. In particular their drummer (who also plays guitar in Gorehead) looked exhausted by the end after a constant display of blastbeats nearly wore him down. Gorehead's lead vocalist and guitarist joined them on stage for a song about "Japanese women shitting on each other" for one of the standouts of their set. Despite any real memorable riffs or moments, Pivorapist still gave it a lot of welly, had people laughing and were just plain sick, twisted, demented and silly fun! 7/10.
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To me, Brainshit is what happens when I have to get up a 7am to go to work on a Monday morning and I'm so tired I can't figure out which direction the alarm clock is beeping from! But for this Manchester duo, Brainshit is a super aggressive Powerviolence inspired band with just a drummer and a guitarist. I've heard a lot about this duo tearing a new sinkhole into Manchester, so I was very glad to see them at last! Brainshit's music is very playful but also very tense. They can be play a sweet, slow as fuck Sludge riff one moment, and then out of nowhere break into lightning fast Grindcore riffs, even if it's just for 10 seconds. Brainshit don't do formulaic music and were consistently unpredictable on stage. They have some very short songs, which gave their set a frantic stop/start energy that would throw the moshers off. I could only stand in true awe as I watched a relentlessly blistering set of supremely noisy and brash riffs. Drummer Jon especially looked like he had a full workout on the kit, also adding vocals. This duo are very tight and both share a fantastic vision of their music. If only Slap-A-Ham Records still existed! By the end of their set, Jon had beaten the shit out of his cymbals so hard they ended up shattering! The All-Dayer just went next level! 9/10.
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Manchester locals Gorehead play old school brutal Death Metal the right way! Their performance was chock full of technically proficient riffs and a dense, heavy sound with plenty of aggression. I've seen Gorehead a few times now and they seem to get better and better each time. Whilst their take on Death Metal isn't exactly full of originality (this also applies to 95% of modern Death Metal bands), they do nostalgia exceptionally well. You'll hear influences of Death and Obituary, with elements of early Sepultura and Entombed thrown in too. The last time I saw Gorehead, their guitarist and vocalist Luch was bound to sitting down on stage after suffering an injury. Tonight he made a great recovery and I have to say that Gorehead have comeback extremely well because this was the best I've heard them yet! 9/10.
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Wolfbastard are a Manchester based Blackened Crust Punk band who have been gathering a lot of momentum in the local scene. They share band members with one of Manchester's favourite Black Metal bands Burial. Wolfbastard's songs are a little more immediate than their blackened brothers, and pack a real punch. They have a knack of taking Punky Motorhead-esque riffs and dragging them through a muddy forest and then smashing them on the concrete, so that they come out agonised and filthy. Wolfbastard ripped through a high energy set of Satanic hate fuelled carnage, and in particular their vocalist Joe expressed so much passion and enthusiasm for his craft. Because I'm a huge Black Metal fan, their more Blackened leaning songs stood out to me more. One song had a vintage Darkthrone vibe, with a cold and eerie riff creeping through. They tried out an especially brutal new song which went down well, but who could deny the no nonsense horrors of their vile anthem "Sick In the Bath"!? 8/10.
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Rebellion Manchester is usually no stranger to Doom, Sludge and Stoner bands, but today it had shifted over to the Star & Garter down the road where Bongripper were headlining a show. A day of fast bands was a more than welcome change, but they did manage to squeeze one slower band into the mix. Dead Moon Lizard Kings hail from Middlesbrough, and whilst they definitely expressed a Psychedelic/Stoner Rock sound, I could also hear faint Hardcore influences in their sound too. Particularly their energetic and animated frontman Metal Dan who had a shrill bark to his vocals that made me think of bands like Helmet and Drive Like Jehu.
Unfortunately for Dead Moon Lizard Kings, it felt like the odds were stacked against them tonight. Whilst this gig started with a very strong crowd, at this point of the day some Metalheads did start leaving to get to the Bongripper show where local favourites Boss Keloid were kickstarting their evening. Maybe it was because they were sandwiched between lots of fast bands, but the band seemed to be sapped of energy, with riffs that plodded along. I noticed that there were sadly more people outside in the smoking area than there were watching the band, leading to a deflated energy in the room. Even more disappointing for Dead Moon Lizard Kings was that their frontman Metal Dan was clearly very unwell, and just 2 songs in he ended up puking up on stage. Though I have to give him props because he soldiered on painfully through the whole set and he was by far the most animated man on the stage. In particular the bassist and guitarist looked very static and fed up whilst playing, with very limp backing vocals adding no extra impact. They did finish on what I thought was by far their best track, a self titled anthem, but this track seemed to just go on and on and on... I ended up getting bored of it by the end!
This was my first time hearing Dead Moon Lizard Kings and maybe the whole touring and Temples fiasco had got to them, because their set lacked enthusiasm. At least I can say the vocalist gave it his all, when they could have easily just pulled out of the show. Perhaps they would have went down better at the Bongripper show to a more like-minded crowd? Who knows, but I think even the band knew themselves that this wasn't their day. 5/10.
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Boycott the Baptist are a Powerviolence/Grindcore duo consisting of a guitarist and drummer, with both members delivering aggressive dual attack vocals... If you think this sounds exactly how I described Brainshit earlier in the show, well it is! The two bands are remarkably similar, but I am just happy to hear some Powerviolence on the go, as it seems to be a largely ignored sound in the UK (though to be fair even at its peak, PV was a shortlived and deeply underground sound). If Brainshit and Boycott the Baptist were to have a race though, I think Boycott would win as they managed to squeeze even more songs into their set, with a couple lasting maybe a second or two long, recalling Napalm Death's infinite classic "You Suffer (But Why)".
Boycott the Baptist had an insanely loud and chunky guitar sound, making the lack of a bassist a moot point! After a bit of a lull from the previous band, Boycott managed to get all the smokers ploughing into the room and the place went mental! Boycott are very good at what they do, with an insane chemistry between these two nuns. "Ray Winstone Can Sit On My Face" was a 30 second blur of noisy grind, whilst a song about skating pulled off an old school Hardcore sound. 1 second wonders "What!?" and "The Happy Birthday Song", left the crowd in stitches. "Fuck Off Trump" appropriately sent the crowd into a violent moshing frenzy, whilst "Yoko Oh No" raged against conceptual art! But the standout for me was "Eels Up Inside You" which was not only hilarious to sing along to, but actually recalled the proper PV legends such as Crossed Out and Spazz! Boycott the Baptist played so ferociously that sound crew and audience members were frequently having to help pick up fallen mic stands and fix broken drum parts! The end result was a brutal, beautiful and hilarious blur of lightning fast aggression that seemed to be over way to soon. True Hardcore in all it's glory! 9/10.
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Hailing from the North East of England, Geist ripped through a set of belting Hardcore with more of an emphasis on melody than some of their peers today. Geist delivered a high energy set chock full of hard hitting bass, Sludgy toned Hardcore riffs and insane blasting drums. Their lead vocalist came into the pit to scream his head off. In particular a really fast brand new song captivated the crowd, whilst an older song off their EP combined Isis-esque Sludge riffs that gradually escalated back into Hardcore. Geist's sound very much reminded me of Converge, and since they are one of my all time favourite bands, that is a high compliment. Yet I would also like to hear something that is truly theirs! 8/10.
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From the moment I first heard the vocals of Kat Shevil I was completely knocked back! Kat's death growls are some of the most powerful, forceful, aggressive and straight up brutal I have ever heard! Of course the whole band produced a similar force of power too, playing fast Punky Death Metal with some Blackened elements cropping up too. Winds of Genocide are heavily influenced by the D-Beat sound (think Discharge, Amebix, Disfear etc.) but I think the band showed a lot more versatility in their sound tonight. In particular the bassist was playing fast, complex scales and alongside the crunchy, bowel churning guitar chaos, their sound was a constant force of lightning fast motion. Geist's vocalist Ian proved himself to be multi-talented as he stepped onto drums for this band. Winds of Genocide is an appropriate name because their music hits you like a hurricane. Vocalist Kat poured so much passion and was possessed on stage like an older Regan from The Exorcist. Highlights from their set included the super fast "Nuclear Winter", and the old school vibes of "In the Shadow of the Sign of Death". I'm amazed the Rebellion stage was still standing after this onslaught! 8/10.
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As more Metalheads started to pour in from the Bongripper show that had just finished, they were treated to one of the best band's of the day. After the slumberous riffs of Bongripper, Aberdeen's Boak must have been a jarring turn, as they were one of the fastest band's on the bill tonight. With a strong Grindcore/PV leaning, Boak tore through a relentless set full of very short, very fast and completely mental songs. The trio were just a blur of sheer noise and violent playing that never let up. The triple threat were completely in tune with each other, and the only times the velocity of their playing slowed down was to throw in some very brief Sludgy riffs, before erupting back into full on blasts and demented screams. This was a concise set of blistering Hardcore done the right way, making Boak the perfect way to lead into headliners ACxDC. 9/10.
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I'm going to put it straight to you... From the moment ACxDC hit the stage and started playing I was so lost in their performance that I forgot to even write down any notes. I believe one of the Rebellion bar staff did have to mop up the copious amounts of drool from my open jaw that flooded the floor! US Powerviolence revivalists ACxDC have a solid reputation built before them, and it's no wonder when they can turn up and play such blistering sets like they did tonight. There was barely any breaks between the songs or moments to catch your breathe as ACxDC pounded their way through what must have been about 50 lightning fast songs barely crossing the 30 second mark. Their musicianship was second to none, and full of so much genuine passion. So many insanely satisfying riffs, pounding drums that threatened to break the kit, and raw vocals that cut like a knife and tore down the walls. Their sound was particularly dense and suffocating, and yet there was something truly beautiful about their performance. After their set had finished crowdgoers demanded an encore. The guys also stuck around for most of the day, selling their own merch and taking time to chat to fans. Simply one of the greatest Hardcore acts around today and a very worthy way to end such a fantastic and exhausting day! Hardcore perfection from true legends! 10/10.
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June 5th 2016 @ Rebellion Manchester.
