CONCERT REVIEW: Igorrr – Melt-Banana – Otto Von Schirach Live at The Crofoot


 

It was a pleasant, late summer evening in Metro Detroit last Wednesday when a hubbub started at the Crofoot. The cherished multi-venue complex was hosting Igorrr’s long-awaited Spirituality & Distortion Fall 2023 run. A multitude of folks paraded into the music hall ready to finally see this act that has been absent for too long. This independent concert space was a supreme choice to cater the wildly unique and epic sounds of French musician, Gautier Serre.

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FESTIVAL REVIEW: Oblivion Access – Various Venues – Austin, Texas


 

After a two year postponement, Oblivion Access Festival finally happened! Although I couldn’t attend all four days of festivities, I drove up to Austin, TX on Saturday to catch the legendary hardcore Youth of Today! It only took over three decades to finally see them lol. The festival was quite an undertaking, involving a lot of local Austin venues on 5th, 6th, and 7th Street. After 3 /12 hours of driving I was ready to stretch my legs, get some blood moving and stay cool in the humid Texas heat. Picking up my passes was a breeze as there were signs posted at Native Hostel directing you to the kind staff who greeted people with friendly smiles and words of encouragement to enjoy themselves.

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FESTIVAL PREVIEW: Oblivion Access Brings a Unique Experience to Music Festivals in Texas This Weekend


Oblivion Access, the eclectic music festival metal, hardcore, hip-hop, electronic, avant-garde, and punk music takes palce this weekend around Austin, Texas. The multi-venue music festival returns to downtown Austin on May 12-15. Tickets are on sale now! Over 100+ artists are now set to perform including Blonde Redhead, Carcass, The Body, Windhand, Deaf Club, Xiu Xiu, Autopsy, Converge, Full of Hell, Zola Jesus, Youth of Today, Danny, Coven, Grouper, Andy Morin (of Death Grips), The Microphones, HO99O9, Massacre, Cities Aviv, King Woman, Billy Woods, and KTRK, and many others. There is also a plethora of other experiences, vendors villages, merch, food, and other experiences on tap. Check out our day by day guide of the can’t miss artists, set times, and other happenings at Oblivion Access.

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Danny Brown, Grouper, Andy Morin (Death Grips), The Microphones, HO99O9, Massacre, Cities Aviv, King Woman, and More Booked for Oblivion Access


Oblivion Access, the eclectic music festival highlighting hip-hop, electronic, avant-garde, and punk has added tremendous new names to the ever expanding bill. The multi-venue music festival returns to downtown Austin on May 12-15. Tickets to each of the newly announced festival concerts will go on sale tomorrow, Friday, February 11th, 2022 at 10 a.m. CT via the link below, in addition to a limited amount of full festival badges at the link below. Joining the lineup are Danny Brown to help headline the expanded four-day fest in addition to other new performers like Grouper, Andy Morin (of Death Grips), The Microphones, HO99O9, Massacre, Cities Aviv, King Woman, Billy Woods, and KTRK, among others. Over 100+ artists are now set to perform including previously announced acts Blonde Redhead, Carcass, The Body, Windhand, Deaf Club, The Locust, Xiu Xiu, Autopsy, Converge, Full of Hell, Zola Jesus, and Youth of Today.

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Every Important Record Store Day Black Friday Release For Rock And Metal Fans


 

alice in chains

 

Record Store Day continues to help lend support to small businesses and local music stores that keep the experience of artist discovery alive every April and November.Today’s Record Store Day Black Friday event will see releases from across rock, metal, punk, indie and pop music this year. More details and a full shopping list for the discerning fan can be found below:Continue reading


Record Store Day Black Friday Releases Include Alice In Chains, Soundgarden, Anthrax, Iron Maiden, Faith No More


records-store-day-black-friday-ghostcultmag

Record Store Day continues to help lend support to small businesses and local music stores that keep the experience of artist discovery alive every April and November. The upcoming Record Store Day Black Friday event will see releases from across rock, metal, punk, indie and pop music this year. More details below: Continue reading


Raw Power Festival – The Dome, London


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Ghost Cult’s tagline is “exploring the boundaries of music”. Luckily Raw Power Festival in at The Dome in London is providing a weekend of weird, wondering and noisy experimental music.

Day One

Metal and any sort of identifiable guitar riffs are largely absent from night one, as was anything so commonplace as a chorus. Opening proceedings is Graham Dunning’s Mechanical Techno, a one-man DJ set with the aesthetic of a garden shed. Dunning uses layers of vinyls in towers to create minimalist beats, but the steampunk-like spectacle includes ping-pong balls and quartz crystals to create an odd light and sound show. Worth seeing for sure, even if the music was a notch above “interesting enough.”

Teeth of a Sea seem to approach music with a kitchen sink approach. Guitars, trumpets, synths, programmed beats; every member of the band plays at least two instruments, usually switching back and forth during each piece of music. There’s a lot going on, each piece builds an intensely layered piece of alluring if incomprehensible nose.

the crowd at The Dome in London, photo credit Raw Power Festival

The crowd at The Dome in London, photo credit Raw Power Festival

The sheer aggression displayed by London’s own veteran industrialists Test Dept: Redux is a great exercise in catharsis. The band are known for their use of “found” percussion instruments, and don’t disappoint; there’s sheet metal, metallic windmills, steel pipes, spring coils, plus two drummers and a host of abstract industrial noises. Primal, aggressive punk done right.

Day Two

Much of day two strays into even more unusual territory. Opener Agathe Max only comes to the stage armed with an electrified violin and some loop pedals, but creates a dense mess of Nosie and feedback. It’s chaotic and a good way to wake up from the fug of the night before.

Bonnnacons of Doom’s short but trippy set feature’s mirror masks, and a banshee-like front woman wearing a witch’s cape and hood. Selvhenter redefine the kind of racket you can make with a saxophone, violin and trombone, and make the kind of jazzy droning distortion most bands couldn’t dream of. The Cult of Dom Keller’s hazy psych rock is perfectly pleasant (and would probably go down well with the likes of NME if it was in a guitar music phase) but compared to most of the band’s on today’s bill they lack any real amount of energy or personality.

Slabdragger and Sly & The Family Drone are the two bands from today that GC readers are probably most familiar with. Croydon’s Slabdragger provide an education in proper riff worship – Sleep’s influences are particularly audible – providing a set as heavy as their name suggests. Despite the crushing riffs, the band have an abundance of energy and get a suitably welcome reception from the crowd. Probably the least weird band of the day, but that’s no bad thing when you can crush it.

Eschewing the stage to instead set up in a ring on the audience floor, Sly & The Family Drone gather the crowd around before covering them in beer and Clingfilm and throwing paper plates at them. It would be easy to believe not a note of the band’s set is pre-planned or rehearsed, the band describe themselves aptly as “a primal orchestra of drum rhythms, radiophonic oscillator noise and electronically-abstracted vocals”. There’s no cohesion, no sense to be found, but it’s chaotic fun and rare to be so close to a band when they play.

With the exception of Baby Metal (and make of those what you will) and Boris, Japanese rock and metal doesn’t get a whole lot of coverage on our fair shores. Props then to Raw Power for putting on three wildly different but very hugely entertaining bands from the Land of the Rising Sun. Qujaku (formerly known as the Piqnic) combine both the quiet and droning extremes of Boris melded together with the ability to lock in to a Queens of The Stone Age-like groove. During the band’s quieter moments, the band’s waif-like vocalist Shyuya Onuki floats about the stage before transforming like a man possessed when the chaos cuts loose. Confusing but compelling to watch.

Pikacyu-Makoto, photo credit Raw Power Festival

Pikacyu-Makoto, photo credit Raw Power Festival

Pikacyu-Makoto a two-piece consisting of Acid Mother Temple’s Kawabata Makoto and Afrirampo’s Pikacyu are far more messy, but no less entertaining. Throughout the set, the drum and guitar combo always treading border between genius and a complete mess. Great when it works, but doesn’t always stay on the right set and occasionally just becomes a bit unlistenable.

Melt Banana, however, are nothing short of excellent, and deliver the set of the weekend. Where there’s been a lot of “weird”, the music Yasuko Onuki and Ichirou Agata make is mental. The combination of punk riffs and grinding drums makes for a crushing set, and Onuuki’s use of motion controlled handset means the bass and drum beats are changed on her cue. Combines brutally heavy with the kind of fun you get from good punk. You’ll rarely see a band like Melt Banana.

Melt-Banana, photo credit Raw Power Festival

Melt-Banana, photo credit Raw Power Festival

Day Three

Sunday is mostly dedicated to punk and the heavier side of things with a few outliers thrown in to catch you off guard. Opening act Ill make music to fit their name; rough, grungy punk with a snotty sardonic sneer. Occasionally remind of Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds at their most abrasive. Lower Slaughter, meanwhile, might be the angriest band on show. The Brighton four-piece are packed with dirty riffs and in front woman Sinead have a ball of lyrical vitriolic rage with a surprisingly throaty growl.

Italian trio Stearica are an instrumental band with personality. They crack jokes between sets, show their humour on stage and the drummer at one point jumps of stage to start eking out a beat on the bar. The Baroness-like riffs help too. All I have in my notes for Mugstar is “riffs upon riffs upon riffs.” The Scouse instrumental quartet know how to make good, driving music with a purpose.

The noisy stoner punk of Workin’ Man Noise Unit is good fun, while Follakzoid are probably the worst band of the weekend. Where the former are all energy, the latter make slow, lazy and uninteresting music. Follakzoid might strut around the stage, but their stage presence doesn’t make up for the lack of interesting music. You should listen to more Workin’ Man Noise Unit instead.

Part Chimp, photo credit Raw Power Festival

Part Chimp, photo credit Raw Power Festival

Considering some of the oddities seen over the weekend, Part Chimp are an oddly straight-laced choice of Sunday headliner. A proper heavy stoner band, the London five piece can jump from more groove-laden to full on crushing at a moment’s notice, but it’s all inhumanely loud and bruising. One of the more unusual festival’s I’ve been to, but no less fun or heavy.

DAN SWINHOE

 


Festival Preview: Raw Power Festival, London, UK


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One of the more unique and intriguing festivals of the summer is this weekend’s 4th annual Raw Power Festival at The Dome in Tufnel Park London. Hosted annually by Baba Yaga’s Hut, purveyors of the finest underground live performances and must know acts; this years fest pulls together the best from the work of psychedelic rock, eclectic electronic acts and avant-garde visionaries. Headlined by the sublime and crazy Melt Banana, they are joined by a bevy of killer bands such as Test Dept: Redux, Picacyu-Makoto, Follakzoid, Teeth of the Sea, Taman Shud, Housewives, Bonnacons of Doom, Mechanical Techno, Part Chimp, Selvhenter, Cult of Dom Keller, Mugstar, Anonymous Bash, Sly & the Family Drone, Orchestre for Spheres, Orlando, ILL, Workin’ Man Noise Unit, Woven Skull, Melting Hands, Lower Slaughter, The Picniq, Stearica, Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs, Slabdragger, and many more. If you don’t have these bands in your collection, you have some research and hours of listening to do.
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The program also includes DJ’s, merch, food and drink options and of course, cool people watching. Be part of something truly special and not the typical fest expeirence. Tickets are stil lavailable for the weekend at this link:


Melt Banana Announce Upcoming North American Tour Dates


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Torche have announced a summer co-headlining tour with Melt Banana in July. Melt Banana will be doing a solo run prior to the co-headline tour. All dates are posted below.

Headline:

May 06: The Crescent – Phoenix, AZ
May 08: The Launchpad – Albuquerque, NM
May 09: Opolis – Norman, OK
May 11: The Firebird – St. Louis, MO
May 12: The Cactus – Milwaukee, WI
May 13: Pyramid Scheme – Grand Rapids, MI
May 14: The Pike Room – Detroit, MI
May 15: Skully’s – Columbus, OH
May 16: Mohawk – Buffalo, NY
May 17: Lee’s Palace – Toronto, ON
May 19: AS220 – Providence, RI
May 21: Great Scott – Boston, MA
May 22: Johnny Brenda’s – Philadelphia, PA
May 23: St. Vitus – Brooklyn, NY
May 24: Maryland Deathfest – Baltimore, MD
May 25: Cat’s Cradle Backroom – Carborro, NC
May 27: Jack rabbit’s – Jacksonville, FL
May 28: The Backbooth – Orlando, FL
May 29: The Church Hill – Miami, FL
May 30: The Orpheum – Tampa, FL
Jun 01: The Earl – Atlanta, GA
Jun 04: Spanish Moon – Baton Rouge, LA
Jun 05: Fitzgerald’s – Houston, TX
Jun 06: Three Links – Dallas, TX
Jun 07: Red 7 – Austin, TX
Jun 10: Club Congress – Tucson, AZ
Jun 11: The Slide Bar – Fullerton, CA
Jun 12: The Catalyst Atrium – Santa Cruz, CA
Jun 13: Harlows – Sacramento, CA

With Torche:

Jul 02: Dante’s – Portland, OR
Jul 03: Chop Suey – Seattle, WA
Jul 04: Venue – Vancouver, BC
Jul 06: Pawn Shop Live – Edmonton, ON
Jul 07: The Gateway at SAIT – Calgary, AB
Jul 08: Amigos Cantina – Saskatoon, SK
Jul 10: Pyramid Cabaret – Winnipeg, MB
Jul 11: The Aquarium – Fargo, ND
Jul 13: The Hi-Fi – Indianapolis, IN
Jul 14: The Empty Bottle – Chicago, IL
Jul 15: High Noon Saloon – Madison, WI
Jul 16: Wooly’s – Des Moines, IA
Jul 17: The Waiting Room – Omaha, NE
Jul 20: Exit/In – Nashville, TN
Jul 21: Rose Music Hall – Columbus, MO
Jul 22: Record Bar – Kansas City, MO
Jul 24: Larimer Lounge – Denver, CO
Jul 25: Urban Lounge – Salt Lake City, UT
Jul 26: The Bunkhouse – Las Vegas, NV
Jul 28: The Casbah – San Diego, CA
Jul 29: The Casbah – San Diego, CA
Jul 31: The Roxy – Los Angeles, CA
Aug 01: Oakland Metro Operahouse – Oakland, CA