Weekend Nachos, The Afternoon Gentlemen, Gets Worse, Goolagoon @ Middle East, Boston, Massachusetts
So I set out on a Pilgrimage, Father, looking for New England (can’t be worse than the old one). My ultimate metal Mecca of choice was to be Maryland Deathfest, but given the expense of getting over here I took the opportunity to go Amtraking across the universe and visit some more cities and friends in this North East corner before ending up there.
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I say friends, internet acquaintances really, but the love of God(flesh) unites and humbles us, and is a great testament to the social power of the internet. Given this position of trust to “Let the wrong one in” to their homes they were also pleased I didn’t turn out to be a “raging asshole”, maybe just a mildly irritating one… 😉
So Boston was the first port of call, going via Dublin on presumably some Irish Express also seemed a good move as we had all the US Customs there instead of the apparent ballache that it is in the supersecure homeland.
Interview at Customs
Officer – What is the purpose of your visit to the United States?
Suspicious bearded type – I’m going to a music festival
Officer – What kind of music?
Shifty eyed troublemaker – Errr… kind of extreme metal
Officer – Any bands I might have heard of?
Convicted felon – Hmm…. Testament? Venom?
Deep-cover metalhead – That’s not very extreme, I thought you were going to say Cannibal Corpse or Morbid Angel!
A pleasant few days then to be had out in the leafy suburbs of Lexington, entering Harvard, discovering my olde worlde phone couldn’t even reach space from here, temporarily recapturing the flag for Wales from those pesky revolutionaries, attempting to fill the pit of the amazing Armageddon Shop with all my money in return for the unrivalled selection of punk and metal vinyl they had, failing to finish most of my portions of food, watching The Witch then walking in the woods, and ending up at this venue of renown. According to the locals it is one of the longstanding venues that has hosted a great selection of underground and alternative, whilst simultaneously offering some great exotic food as the name suggest. A feast of bands too, and our initial panic of hearing it had sold out meant that our planned surprise visit was in danger of backfiring but Plan B just meant surprising our fellow friends from the UK by blagging onto their guestlist.
Locals Goolagoon opened the entertainment in the pretty small side room, with their Spongebob Squarepants themed raw hardcore. Yes, this is a thing. A Leeds, England double header next, Gets Worse, who have gotten bigger with this first time seeing them as a 4piece. Definitely given them a phatter, heavier sound, especially to be enjoyed in the floor shaking breakdowns in between their spazz out super fast power violence explosions. Managed to miss Tinnitus due to line-up mix-ups but next we had the professional shambolic aggression of the Afternoon Gents. With them having toured the States before with the Nachos it was great to see the fervent response to their fermented grind. For all their musical ferocity they simultaneously seem to have a great time on stage, and there’s enough hooks in the constantly shifting song structures to keep the fun infectious. Finally we have Weekend Nachos on their farewell tour, not that they are particularly old but they’ve certainly worked this project hard all over the world in that time. And talk about going out with a bang, their ferociously fast power-violence incites insanity like I hadn’t seen for a while. Waves of stage divers with nihilistic abandon cartwheeling slams into the side walls, it’s a party to the finish/death. The place is rammed and the band are beaming at the response, seeming to hit their stride with extra impact, the hyper rhythms and riffs electrifying the room. All in all a great sweat soaked warm up to the further chaos to come
