Well, Morrowfest at Rock City certainly had its ups and downs for me - the downs mainly because of my non-existant navigational skills and an out-of-date sat nav. Indeed, so useless was my navigation technology that after driving round in circles for half hour, I abandoned my car in the nearest car park and walked to the venue - with the aid of a Google Maps phone app (I don’t have a a car holder for my phone yet, so couldn’t use it as a sat nav while driving). Even with that, I didn’t know my “north” for my “south” and took a while to get to the venue - and find my car after Doom had levelled Rock City!
All this meant that I couldn’t nip back to my car to dump LPs I’d bought or grab my pack up lunch!
Luckily, the ups - manely the blinding music - made it all worthwhile. Of course, I didn’t like all the bands - Drunk In Hell, Drunken bastard and The Sontaran Experiment all left me cold, but I guess they were good at what they do.
For me, Endless Grinning Skulls were the band of the day. Their brand of brutal, energetic hardcore was delivered by a hugely entertaining frontman and their LP, complete with a Crass-style poster cover is fantastic.
Doom were also blinding. It’s easy to forget how cool some of their riffs are. Tonight, despite a couple of string breaks testing the audience’s patience, the band were on fire. Anti-Social was my own personal favourite. Brutal, hard, heavy and in-your-face, Doom were a perfect end to the day for me (I don’t like main stage headliners Orange Goblin).
Latest vocalist Denis walked on stage in a police flat jacket and proceeded to sweat his bollocks off - and even show off his rapping skills during the string break breaks. The sound seemed very good too, with Bri’s guitar literally jumping out of the mix, allowing for maximum D-beat effect.
Earlier, I Like Bugs were fantastic. Bloody Kev’s “other band” were fast, energetic and put on a great show. More traditional hardcore bands Walk The Plank and Break It Up both delivered energetic anf hugely enjoyable sets. I haven’t come across either band before (apparently Break It Up) haven’t played for six years, but the boundless energy of them both got sizable pits moving.
Labrat were also fantastic - their brand of chaotic grindcore was exactly the kind of thing I love. Havening missed them first time round, I was super excited to finally have a chance to see them - and I wasn’t disappointed.
Rock ‘n’ roll bands Goatspeed and Jaded Eyes both did that fast punk-socked rock pretty well. The former maybe would have fared better in the Basement as the sound was a bit lost in the Main Hall, but nevertheless, it’s worth keeping an ear out for them both.
