Sequels are never easy. Everyone remembers that fresh, exciting debut that seemingly came out of nowhere to blow everyone away but following it up doesn’t always work out. For every Aliens, there’s a Jaws 2 (and even the odd Jaws 3D) and it turns out that the same even holds true for festivals. There’s always a temptation for bigger draws – more stages, bigger headliners, maybe the odd bit of corporate sponsorship – but thankfully Core. Festival have stuck to their guns for their second instalment and continued in doing what they do best – bringing the loudest, noisiest and most unique live acts from the UK and beyond, all while placing an emphasis on community and inclusivity that has never been more vital than it is today.
Opening night takes place solely at Woodside Halls, a venue that feels a little more put-together than last year’s location but features that same “didn’t I used to go to school here” kind of vibe that makes it so inviting. Also, it’s less than five minutes’ walk from the weekend’s sister venue The Hug and Pint, meaning fresh sounds and fresh pizza are never too far away. Kicking off are Nü Cros, a new-ish Glasgow crew who, based on the energetic crowd and even the odd attendee singing along, are already making a name for themselves. Their take on post-hardcore is anything but predictable, at times opting for ferocious, percussive riffing that would have gone down a storm at Ozzfest back in the day, and then switching to up-tempo emo-punk that feels cut from the same time period, if not the same cloth. There’s equal conviction in both sides of their sound, bolstered by a meaty bass tone that has the room rattling, and when a second guitarist joins the stage at the set’s finale, it leaves vocalist Kevin O’Brien free to dash, stomp and prowl the stage, bellowing all the while. He’s an impressive figure to watch and based on both their performance and their reception, they’re only going to get bigger.
In contrast, Whitelands’ success is a considerably more subtle and pleasant affair. Firmly ensconced in the ‘dreamier is better’ shoegaze camp, dual guitarists Etienne Quartey and Michael Anelaja work in complete concert to build the finest yet sturdiest of frameworks, leaving drummer Jagun Meseorisa to keep their songs trundling along and bassist Vanessa Govinden to provide what are easily the band’s most melodic touches. Her basslines are punchy yet effective, often lingering in the mind even when the band have taken a break, and when coupled with the delicate emotionality of Quartey’s voice, the effect is almost mesmerising.
Whitelands (Photo by Bruce Cowie)
The first of several Stateside contributions this weekend, Glitterer are rightly one of the festival’s biggest draws and they do not disappoint, making the most of their brief, immediately accessible back catalogue to draw the room in fast, and hard. Ned Russin has always had one of the most distinctive voices in punk, slightly off-kilter but rich enough that he can carry off anything with charm and character, and on-stage he matches it with boundless enthusiasm, bouncing and high-kicking his way across the room any time that he isn’t pinned down to the mic. ‘I Made The Call’ gives keyboardist Nicole Dao a chance to come more to the fore, her offerings a heavenly counterbalance to Russin’s earthy low end, but closer ‘Are You Sure?’ captures them at their most straightforward, a chunky wedge of pop-punk ear candy that hits all the right notes and leaves the room roaring for more.
It’s hard to think of any band alive right now who can whip a crowd into a frenzy quite like Show Me The Body. They’re as NYHC as you can get without Harley Flanagan being somehow involved, a rough-hewn blend of street poetry, industrial noise and sheer, unapologetic ferocity, and tonight they are given a reception normally reserved for conquering heroes returning from battle. ‘Out Of Place’ starts off on an unassuming foot, Julian Pratt’s lines delivered in a mumblemuttered drawl, but it’s ‘Boils Up’ that really unleashes the trio’s full force. An all-out assault of gravelly low end, power electronics and barbaric percussion, Pratt barking out lyrics as he attacks his banjo with disdain, this is precisely why they were invited and met with such love.
Show Me The Body (Photo by Bruce Cowie)
It’s the crowd’s response to this that makes Show Me The Body’s live performances so memorable. It’s not just the energy, the vibrant pits that tear through the room and the steady stream of stage divers; even more than that, it’s the large percentage of the crowd who scream along to every. single. word. When the sound dies down for ‘Loose Talk’, a relatively restrained introduction showing the more contemplative side of Pratt’s banjo playing, the audience’s singing arguably eclipses what’s happening on stage. As the night builds to a climax, the announcement of a song “From our city to yours” and the subsequent iconic intro to The Beastie Boys’ ‘Sabotage’ kicking in, all semblance of restraint is lost. That stream of stage divers becomes a deluge, the entire hall seemingly just a tangled mess of flailing limbs and sweat, and the energy on-and-off-stage becomes impossible to contain. Though they’re not quite done, they’ve already made their point – this is how festivals should go from here on out.
Saturday sees the opening of two new stages, the aforementioned Hug and Pint and Woodside Halls’ more intimate Room 2 stage. Sticking with The Hug and Pint at first, opening up are Glasgow emo/alt-rock crew Hey, Lonely Planet. Much as with Nü Cros yesterday, it’s not the easiest job to pin them down to any one genre as they straddle a myriad of sounds, but in a similar vein they manage to make this eclecticism work for them. Vocalist Elise approaches her acerbic lines with a smile, the brilliantly-titled ‘hellokittyacab’ seeing her deliver maximum scorn with the detached poise of a scene veteran, and though the rough backing vocals don’t always fit, even when the band do knuckle down to bring the noise, their set is filled with so much obvious conviction and joy at creating a catchy, irreverent racket that they’re just an absolute delight.
Following them up are Slowlight, who strike up an immediate sense of déjà vu for anyone who made it to the festival last year. Half of the band were in 2023 festival openers flinch. but where their other outfit was a smidgen more reflective, Slowlight are content to let the hooks do the talking. Beth Black’s stage presence is as magnetic as ever, letting herself be swept away in the mantric refrain of ‘The Only Thing I Want Is To Know What I Want’ yet delivering a commanding turn on comeback single ‘That’s Pretty Good (For A Girl)’. Meanwhile, guitarists Joy and Colin complement each other perfectly while taking subtly different routes to create melodies that shimmer and burst with energy.
Although there’s plenty of action here for the rest of the day, special mention has to go to returning local legends Holy Mountain, whose first show in years went down a storm. Very much a band who sound exactly how you’d expect them to sound given their name, a heady mix of Sabbath and mid-period Sleep with a dash of Monster Magnet for good measure, they still do it better than most. Andy McGlone lays down tarry riffs and spry bursts of six-string mastery as Pete Flett and Allan Stewart deliver rhythms that somehow manage to carry a loose, easy swagger while remaining impossibly tight, letting their set breathe and flow with an unhurried ease that keeps the heads nodding steadily for the next 30 minutes.
Holy Mountain (Photo by Bruce Cowie)
Over at Room 2, there’s another comeback special happening with Cutty’s Gym, a post-hardcore quartet who have returned after years in the wilderness to cut shapes and deliver blistering noise and bellicose rants in equal measure. Noise rock at its most chaotic, there’s a constant feeling of tension in their riffs, a sense that everything could just collapse if any of them dared to not deliver maximum intensity at any given moment, but thankfully that fall never happens. Philip Differ stalks and paces across the stage with purpose and poise, and even when the band are brought to an abrupt halt (possibly due to an audience member passing out) it’s barely a blip in an otherwise savage set.
The room is also the venue for perhaps the band of the day, German-Ukrainian black metal outfit Machukha playing their first and only show outside of Germany. It’s a performance that stresses intensity, with frantic bursts of blastbeats and frazzle-fried tremolo building walls of noise around vocalist Natalya Andrasova’s impassioned, tortured howls. Their music is laden with pain, loss and emotion and it can be keenly felt watching Natalya as she staggers and clutches at the air, later falling to her knees as the band switch gears into solemn, unsettling ambience. The effect is slightly hampered by echoes of last year’s Celeste performance, with an excess of natural light diminishing the effects of the strobe lighting which should have left the crowd in a state of stunned disarray, but even without that aspect their set remains an absolutely breathtaking display of fury and unflinching emotional honesty.
In the main hall, it was a noise-centric list today that kicked off with the unstoppable Part Chimp. Long considered one of the loudest bands in the UK, they waste no time in tearing the absolute roof off a sadly half-empty room with the kind of no frills, heavy as fuck riff-oriented noise rock that sadly seems in short supply these days. At their heaviest, they work in complete concert, all hands on deck attempting to bury the room in a tidal wave of sludgy low end, but one of their greatest assets is that they can accomplish the same level of power even as they drift off into their own respective lanes, Iain Hinchliffe and Tim Cedar both treating the stage as a playground as they trade lead licks with casual dexterity. Coupled with Cedar’s belligerent yowls, they just exude heaviness. It’s not entirely punk or sludge or doom or whatever, it’s just rock’n’roll and it sets the tone for what follows in a way that few other bands could.
Speaking of legends, they’re followed up by none other than bloody Mclusky, about a day after they announced that they’ll be releasing their first new album in twenty years in 2025 – needless to say, folks are rather excited. Is that why Jack Egglestone’s kit has been set up behind a plexiglass shield? No-one knows, but it doesn’t hold the trio back as they rip through a greatest hits set that never quite sits in the punk or noise-rock camp but rather exists in its own little universe, one filled with bewildering diversions and cutting wit. ‘She Will Only Bring You Happiness’ proves a mid-set delight, the crowd chanting along to the refrain of “Our old singer is a sex criminal” making for an odd spectacle, but Andrew Falkous’ between-song banter on topics ranging from Glasgow’s love of a good ballad to the dubiousness of pop punk bands deserves mention in its own right. Chuck in a sneering run-through of ‘Alan Is A Cowboy Killer’ and the fact that newer cuts like ‘Unpopular Parts Of A Pig’ have a wild energy that already makes them feel like well-established favourites and you have the perfect mid-Saturday pick me up.
To an extent, a band like Employed To Serve are maybe an odd choice given the rest of the bands gracing today’s main stage but it’s genuinely pretty easy to see why they had to be included somehow. Justine Jones is one of those rare frontwomen who practically defines their genre, stalking the stage with a grin as she belts out throat-shredding roars, and in Sammy Urwin they have a guitarist just as captivating in his own right, his soloing technical yet melodic, in keeping with the band’s own carefully-crafted approach to heaviness. If metalcore as a genre is reaching its ultimate endpoint, Employed To Serve might be the ones to perfect it. The riffs, the impeccably tight musicianship, Jones’ undeniable power and charisma – they all gel in a way that would maybe be too clever if it weren’t so easy to get swept up in it.
Employed To Serve (Photo by Bruce Cowie)
The festival’s organisers have stated that Gilla Band were one of their earliest picks for this weekend, and on a day like today they do seem to fit right in. Rigid martial beats, burst of distorted violence, pulsating synths and just the right amount of weirdness to keep it all on an unsteady keel is a winning combination but somehow it doesn’t quite click. It might be the fact that the crowd had already expended their energy with Employed To Serve but the reaction feels muted, which is a shame as their set is pulled off with precision and gusto. Still, they’re having a ball and as far as day two is concerned, no-one could argue that it has been anything but a colossal success.
Room 2 opens on Sunday with one of the more intriguing entries this year, a Scottish four-piece known as The Rhubarb. Although their sound definitely takes root in stoner, doom and heavy metal, there’s evidently plenty of love for soul and gospel in their makeup, most notably in the vocal contributions of Seán Maguire and bassist Hannah White, both of whom have a richness and depth of tone that easily sets them apart from an overcrowded scene. Unfortunately, tragedy strikes as White’s E-string snaps after just one song and with no replacement to be found, she is left to make do with the three that remain. Without those lowest tones there are points where the sound feels noticeably empty but what’s more admirable is how the band simply plough through the remainder of their set, the twin vocals and a wealth of quality riffs meaning that at least a few here will be catching them again the first chance they get.
The doom continues with the hitherto unknown Gravis Tristus, whose black hooded robes and initial insistence on playing facing away from the crowd makes any doubt of what they are going to sound like disappear like a tray of brownies at a Weedeater gig (though the presence of a trombone is definitely an unexpected treat). Yup, this is tried and true doom, big muddy riffs run through a gauntlet of distortion pedals as a bearded fella lets out an ursine roar when the time feels right. It’s traditional yet genuinely well-executed, throwing in moments of calm reflection to keep things from growing stale, and a foray into Gregorian chant as the set begins to wind down shows the real potential to carve a unique niche for themselves. That ever-cursed sunlight does threaten to kill the atmosphere but they sound big, loud and thoroughly grim so in the end who really cares about a bit of sun(nO)))shine)?
Gravis Tristus (Photo by Bruce Cowie)
Once again, the little stage that could is where what many agree to be the band of the day take stage, namely Nottingham post-BM outfit Underdark. This is modern black metal par excellence, waves of tremolo and tight, furious percussion led by a frontwoman with an incredible vocal range and the stage presence of a seasoned pro. Stage presence might not be quite right, though, as she spends as much time in the midst of the crowd, contorting her body and generally getting as in-your-face with the packed room as she does with the rest of the band. There is a bittersweet edge as they confess that this will be bassist and co-founder Stephen Waterfield’s final show with the band but if anything, it just makes them more determined to make this a memorable one. As they rip through the bulk of last year’s Managed Decline, they achieve a sublime balance of razor-throated fury and measured calm, and there’s a feeling that for everyone here who wasn’t already aware of Underdark, they’ll definitely be paying attention now.
One of this weekend’s biggest wild cards was always going to be OMO, a new project featuring members of Desalvo, Mogwai, Take A Worm For A Walk Week and Aereogramme. All that was known was that they take influence from Sunn O))), Melvins and, based on the song titles on their setlist, 17th century Japanese swordsman Miyamoto Musashi – which is, on reflection, a pretty positive sign. As vocalist P6 (Phil Eaglesham) saunters out decked in a ruff and a felt crown and gets down to business, echoes of his past time bewildering audiences in Desalvo come flooding back. Immensely charming but blessed with a voice that could curdle milk, he croons and moans to a backdrop of sludgy bliss, all tectonic low-end and percussion that pounds on the nerves as Jonny Scott hammers on the skins. According to P6, they had never even played together until this morning and he has no idea what they sound like, and to be perfectly honest neither does anyone else. This is filthy, irreverent, grimy music, dissonance held together with strangely urgent grooves, and it’s a little bit brilliant.
OMO (Photo by Bruce Cowie)
As another band making their live debut, Gout don’t have quite the hype machine going for them as they take the stage at The Hug and Pint early on Sunday afternoon, which is maybe fortunate for those of the “I saw them before they were big” persuasion. Starting off as a solid enough sludge 4-piece, with some quality grooves and a lithe, energetic frontman, there’s a moment where everything switches. Suddenly they’re a folk band, knocking out a traditional-sounding shanty with 3-part harmonies executed so smoothly you’d think they were practicing them in the womb. Though they do return to more aggressive, upbeat terrain in short order, the fact that they pull off that switch with such confidence is reason enough to want to check them out again.
Although Woodside dominates on Sunday, The Hug and Pint does beckon later in the day for the return of Hexis, one of the weekend’s biggest draws. It’s been many a year since the Danes last stopped through Glasgow and in the interim they have only gotten darker, nastier and more intense. Clad in tracksuit bottoms and a windbreaker, Filip Anderson is hardly the stereotypical black metal frontman but as the room darkens and a barrage of blastbeats, buzzsaw riffing, dizzying strobes and a truly bestial roar takes over, the band show why their reputation precedes them. This is true catharsis, an outpouring of spleen and wrath that seems to come from the core of the soul rather than anything more overt, and as the waves of distortion begin to ebb and flow, letting shards of melody filter through the murk, it’s almost soothing to witness. For 30 minutes, they are completely relentless and when they leave the stage, you almost feel that you can breathe a little more freely.
It was always a given that Dvne would be taking the main stage here. As one of Scotland’s most ambitious heavy acts, their evolution (and popularity) has been astonishing to watch, culminating in this year’s Voidkind, a sure pick for many AotY lists already. It’s from that record that much of their set is culled, truly letting them demonstrate not just their craft but also the intricacies in its execution. Plenty of attention can be drawn to Dan Barter and Victor Vicart’s complementary guitarwork, sinewy and melodic on their own but when paired, they twist and intertwine to create new melodies in their own right. Still, it’s Dudley Tait’s drumming that is the real MVP here. There’s power, there’s technique and, most importantly, there’s a sense of groove that grounds their epic compositions, ensuring that no matter how many twists and turns are taken, nothing here feels extraneous. If you’re going to add a bit of prog to your metal festival, Dvne should definitely be at the top of your list.
Dvne (Photo by Laurie)
As with Mclusky the day previous, The Fall Of Troy have always been one of those bands whose influence has perhaps come to eclipse their own popularity. It’s so easy to find a dozen bands with bursts of hyper-technical frenzy, obtuse lyricism and a see-sawing approach to savagery and melody, but the Mukilteo, WA trio did it earlier and, at least on this occasion, did it better. Their rendition of ‘I Just Got This Symphony Goin’ nails this approach perfectly, Thomas Erak tapping out a complex, tightly executed intro that is all the more memorable for its intricacy before trading screeches with Jon-Henry Batts, and when members of fellow Washingtonians Kaonishi rush the stage for ‘F.C.P.R.E.M.I.X.’ the influx of energy is like watching a little bit of math-punk history being made.
It was always the case that Author & Punisher would be the odd man out this weekend, and that’s probably because of the fact that no-one sounds quite like him. Or in this case them, as tonight Tristan Shone has brought backup in the form of a live guitarist, helping to add texture and, more importantly, oomph. Opener ‘Drone Carrying Dread’ is the perfect vehicle to ease the room in, Shone demonstrating the full melodic range of his drone machines as he slides from morose introspection to soaring, stadium-filling triumph with practiced ease, but ‘Incinerator’ hits like a baseball bat to the temple. Here is where the addition of guitars really start to pay off, punctuating the blunt-force-trauma percussion and filling the space between with washes of beautiful noise. A lot of the discussion about Author & Punisher tends to stress the sheer ingenuity that goes into its existence but this performance is a perfect example of how much those initial blueprints have evolved in terms of composition and execution. This is grade-A industrial metal and when ‘Nihil Strength’ is rolled out as the set is winding down, all that can be done is to nod appreciatively as the waves of sound come crashing down.
Author & Punisher (Photo by Bruce Cowie)
Of course, everything good comes to an end eventually. With that in mind, Core. had always intended to go out swinging with Empire State Bastard but with the news that this will be their last show for at least a year or two, it’s maybe a bittersweet ending. Leading with the gut-punch immediacy of ‘Stutter’, Simon Neil staggers and lurches across the stage, fully immersed in the incredible violence of Mike Vennart’s guitarwork. After a few songs, Neil is shirtless and on his knees, howling to the rafters and the band as a whole are going through emotional loop-de-loops, rolling between relentless assaults on kits, strings and keys and moments of relative restraint, though even these bristle with some intensity. A couple of new cuts aside, this is a set that is greeted by an audience who already have every note etched into their hearts, screaming and sweating as if their souls depended on it, and in return ESB look like a band who are truly honoured to be on this stage. Closing off with ‘The Looming’, it feels a fitting end to the weekend as a whole – massive, noisy and emotional, with just the right mix of audial violence and technical excellence.
So what else is there to say? Core. once again nailed the assignment, bringing together old and new, homegrown talent and legends from across the globe, and stressed inclusivity and community in a way that felt so naturally effortless you have to wonder why so many other festivals seem to struggle as much as they do. Anyway, go support your scene. Go watch local bands, buy merch if you can, listen to someone you’ve never checked out before and buy some decent earplugs.
Empire State Bastard (Photo by Laurie)
Empire State Bastard (Photo by Laurie)
