Photos & text by Adam Murray
Long day here. Caught 14 bands on 6 stages throughout town, one being way outside of town, although I couldn’t help but get that ol’ Schindler feeling – I coulda got more, just a few more. Hoax, No Statik, Winter, A Place To Bury Strangers. Ah well, can’t get em all. Next year I’m bringing a second photographer.
Started at the day show at Beerland for Stick Together (straight edge HC), Power Trip (straight forward metal, bit of throwback thrash, but not too throwback), Midnight and Toxic Holocaust, the last two of which I’ve seen/covered quite a bit in the past and will continue to in the future. It was fun, Beerland is a sweaty lil’ shoebox of a bar, heavy metal sauna on full blast. Once Midnight was warmed up, it was easily 120 degrees in there at roughly 400 percent humidity.
Quick hotel break to change shirt, charge stuff, call my lady, drink a beer and then run back down to Mohawk for crustfathers Deviated Instinct, then over to Red 7 (two stages) for lots of punk and metal. Things were getting a little interesting here – Terrorism, a one man mega-raw black metal type of deal went on. Only vocals were live, the rest tracked. Terrorism’s angry schtick (he was mad about Absu cancelling) included breaking vases of baby powder on the ground in front of the stage, and then a cinderblock, a lot violent gesturing, although (somewhat disappointingly) no actual self-mutilation ever occurred. There was some instrument mutilation as one annoyed audience member through a hunk of cinderblock back at the guy, only to miss and put it through the kick drum head instead – harsh.
On the outside stage was Avon Ladies, very satisfying punk rock, good band check em out. Their mosh pit was lively to say the least. One clever jester decided to discharge a fire extinguisher. Didn’t discourage any moshers (or the band) despite the peppery, chokey, blindy feeling one experiences from breathing that shit. Someone else threw a full can of garbage. I enjoyed the festive spirits in this room. Back inside, Morbosidad were loboto-raping with their Satanic Mexican blood metal. A bible was burned but I missed the shot (I was buying a bootlegged Bolt Thrower shirt). After that, Ares Kingdom laid down a top notch, heady shreddy set. Outside, Jersey hardcore guys Tear It Up were, well, tearing it up. Huge energy off the stage with these guys – a veritable stage dive long jump contest. Back inside once more for Black Witchery’s raw, skull-hammering black metal, and then it was curtains.
INSANE PHOTO GALLERY AFTER THE JUMP!!!
I thought the night was over, but there was this aftershow that kept presenting itself to me. It sounded interesting but it was pretty far out of town at a place called Broken Neck. I got about halfway back to my room before determining that I was not here to sleep, I was here to take pictures of bands, and the venue name and location sounded mysterious, so I hopped in a cab and took off for the boons.
Broken Neck is a warehouse with a stage inside, mystery solved. It felt a little middle-of-nowhere-ish, but that is not a difficult feeling to achieve once you’re a mile or so out of town. It was around 3:15 when I got there. I may have missed one band, not sure, but Skizophrenia were on stage when I walked in. They are one of the handful of Japanese crust outfits that had been making their way around all weekend. I like these guys – loud, fast, noisy and nutty. Hung around a bit and then Ice Age, young punks from Denmark, played their set. Definitely glad I caught the after party. Hit the sack around 6 or so, day two down the hatch.
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