The second day of Core. brought us a full line-up and the opening of the other stages of the festival, the smaller room in Woodside Halls, and the already very familiar The Hug & Pint. Woodside Halls is one of those old community buildings where there are many corridors, stairs and corners, and on my first attempt to find the small stage I wandered into a tiny room where a guitar and amp were set up where you could try and test the exclusive Core. guitar pedal. Yes, this festival had their own pedal made, which is a pretty cool thing to do if you ask me, but not sure how many people would fork out £150 to buy a pedal at a festival. The idea to be able to test it before you buy it is pretty nice though.
Anyway, The Hug & Pint had the first band on of the day, Hey, Lonely Planet, who played a nice mix of grungey rock mixed with emo bits mainly due to the drummer and bass player’s screamo vocals. Like last year Core. provides great opportunities for some younger local bands to play at the festival, and Hey, Lonely Planet took this opportunity on board very well. Rather than walking across to the Woodside Halls I decided to soak up the delicious pizza smells at The Hug & Pint and wait for Slowlight to start. There was an instant recognition of Slowlight’s bass player and singer Beth, who opened up Core. in 2023 with Flinch. They played a great set of post-hardcore influenced alternative rock, showing great musicianship and some nice stage banter as well. Following this I managed to make it back just in time to see Glasgow punk band KUTE play their last song called ‘Take It Off’, sounding very catchy and kinda making me regret not seeing their whole set.
Slowlight at The Hug & Pint
Now as I was in the Woodside Halls now I decided to stick around checking some merch tables whilst waiting for the mighty veterans of noise rock Part Chimp to take stage. This was actually my first time seeing them live, and after having heard so many good stories about their live sets I was looking forward to some heavy loudness. They were perhaps not as loud in volume as their reputation made me think they were going to be, but they played a solid set of noise rock, and the band clearly enjoyed being on stage and playing live. I later bought a vinyl copy of their latest record Drool, which I later realised I already have on my shelf at home. Top tip: don’t buy records after you’ve had a few beers.
Part Chimp
Staying in the noise rock territory, the mighty Mclusky was on next on the main stage, adding a hefty layer of post-hardcore to the noise rock mix. This is another band I have heard so much about but never managed to see live. So, this was another exciting moment. I’m not sure why, but the drummer was sitting behind a wall of plexiglass, which made me think back to the Covid pandemic years not so long ago, but it was probably done for a technical sound reason. Saturday’s stage banter was definitely won by Mclusky’s guitarist/singer Andrew Falkous, having some fast fired monologues and interactions with the crowd. They played a ferocious set, including a slower song they described as a ballad “as everyone loves a good ballad”, with the rest of the set concentrating on thick riffs accompanied by some fantastic heavy bass lines.
This year’s Core. also meant the return of Holy Mountain, the psychedelic Sabbath influenced rock band from Glasgow that created quite a havoc in the Scottish music scene over a decade ago. They’ve played the sporadic gig over the last couple of years, but this day saw them officially return to the live stage, and it was as if they’d never left. Crammed on the small stage of The Hug & Pint, with their own drum kit squeezed in the centre of the stage they played a great set of psychedelic heavy stoner riffs, and I remembered how much I used to enjoy watching drummer Pete, still playing with those enormous cymbals. Small anecdote, I used to play in a band called A Fight You Can’t Win and back in May 2012 we supported Holy Mountain at long gone venue Electric Circus in Edinburgh, but that’s a story for another day.
Holy Mountain
Back to the main stage for some metalcore provided by the always excellent Employed To Serve. I found the placement on the schedule a bit odd, as I they were Saturday’s odd one out on the main stage which focused mainly on noise rock and post-hardcore, and I think having Employed To Serve headline the stage instead would have made more sense to me. However, they really played a tight set full of fast and heavy metal riffs, with singer Justine growling and screaming along. The crowd perhaps didn’t show the response to the band as I was expecting (or rather hoping for), as there were only a small number of people attempting to start a mosh pit, which never really took off, but Justine did manage an attempt on the wall of death midway through their set, which resulted in some people going for it with passion, whilst a lot of people standing on the edges of the room wondering when they could go back to the centre again. Perhaps this wasn’t the right audience or time of day for intense metalcore.
My highlight of the day was next at the small stage at Woodland Halls, Ukranian/German post-black metal band Machukha, who recently released their excellent album Mochari through Consouling Sounds. Vocalist Natalya sings in her native Ukranian language, bringing a lot of anger and emotion to the fierce black metal riffs, with their music also having a lot of beautiful quieter passages and bits of ferocious blackened hardcore. They were very impressive and I hope I get to see them again soon, maybe at Roadburn Festival as they would really fit in well there.
Ending the day for me were main stage headliners Gilla Band, another name I had heard of a lot, but never listened to before, and obviously also my first time seeing them live. They played a hypnotic set of post-punk influenced noise rock, which was very enjoyable to listen to. Were they the right headliners though? Compared to Friday’s Show Me The Body it wasn’t at the same level of intensity, and hence I think a band like Employed To Serve would have been a better choice there. Anyway, that’s just my take on it.
Today is day 3 and the last day of Core. with another full schedule of great bands to watch, such as Dvne, Auhor & Punisher, Underdark, Empire State Bastard, Coffin Mulch and more.
