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HX24 Artists: Thulcandra, Ante-Inferno, The Infernal Sea, BrainBath, Dreich, The Machinist, Crusaders, Millions Will Die, Wreaking Joy, and Mutalith
Hordes X is always a hotbed of the best in underground heavy music.
The lineup is curated with quality and real metal culture at the front of the mind, so we’re working on a breakdown of some more of the artists appearing this year. If you want to keep your finger on the pulse, get stuck in…
Words: AVZD
BRAINBATH (SATURDAY)
Scotland’s very own Brainbath are serving up 80’s old school inspired Death Metal and although it’s been a couple of years since their self-titled debut release, (and now almost sold out), BrainBath continue to put Scottish death metal on the map! Hot on the heels of last year’s Hellripper, anticipation is brewing to see if the west coast can keep the Hordes riled.
Although self-declared Death-Metallers, the raw, DIY energy draws influence from crust, punk and thrash, the latter being particularly heard in cannibalistically charged track Stripped Clean. Warmaster Kwondo (Vocals) brings unmistakably pained gruffness to a tight backline including Barret (Bass) and Blooter (Drums).
At times you may feel the heavens have opened, as bassier notes boom like thunder, but BrainBath are certainly spawned from a far darker place, (and I don’t just mean Glasgow!). The unhinged guitars of both Kendo and Lobotomizer set target with full throttle myocardial infarction. The detail is not missing in the self-production, the rawness primordial rather than scrappy; the B&Q of Scottish DIY – you can do it when you BrainBath it! Others take note…
THE MACHINIST (SATURDAY)
Hailing from my neck of the woods, comes the mighty, the Mancunian, The Machinist, with another Scottish exclusive providing “Intense, Extreme and Fast Industrial Blackened Death Metal”.
Featuring members from NekroDrako (RIP) and Reign Of Erebus, Horders are sure to be in good solid hands. Unsurprisingly, influences range from Anaal Nathrakh, Darkthrone, Deicide, Emperor, Mayhem, Morbid Angel and The Berzerker but 2020’s I Am Void has a lot more to offer. Opening track Extinction Event offers symphonic sway whereas pursuing track Skin Is Not Enough grinds away on both guitars and drums, as you attempt to catch breath.
The rhythm section crushes shorter track Depopulate from the offset, yet a pause to conjecture, to fathom, that there’s not many Blackened Death Metal bands that can pull of the Industrial angle without sounding cheesy, or overly theatrical darling, and even less from the darkened streets of Manchester.
The Machinist are more than industrial nuance and will bring something a little special to the late September night in Dundee.
DREICH (SUNDAY)
The Granite City may get a bad name for itself in terms of being a bit dreich, but Post-Depressive Suicidal Black Metallers (Post-DSBM) Dreich somehow, (with self-declaring genre aside), redefine the word with morbid exertion. The winds have changed, and a darkened gloomy spell encircles Dundee.
One of the newer established acts at Hordes this year, Dreich describe themselves “…not as a band, but as a blight upon human existence. Not artists, but the sonic alchemists of despair.”
Their 2024 demo shudders the core with two expansive tracks, Cold and Lugubriosity. Cold feels Scottish. A journey into the glens, a promise of loneliness, to breathe, to fill your lungs with moistened air and sink underfoot. “The sentiment, “Anti-Human, Anti-Life,” offers a grim serenade to the abyss of our collective demise.” Musically, Lugubriosity edges closer to the DSBM cliff and the bands from across the North Sea resonate in nihilistic clarity.
Dreich will bring ice cold penetration to this year’s lineup and I suspect, a feeling that can only be described in person rather than in these words. Not to be missed.
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HX24 Artists
MILLIONS WILL DIE (THURSDAY)
“Fucking loud and sweary… you utter bastard.”
That’s how Millions Will Die introduce themselves on FB and fucking right! Perth’s punk three-piece have been away from the crowds a few months now so what better way to bring all that noisy rock n roll punk back than at Hordes this year.
With 2023’s Grieve Today E.P. still smouldering on the “turntable”, it’s great to give it another whirl, bringing back the street punk vocals, fast riffs and pounding beats. Title track Grieve Today fills the room with nostalgia. A strong nod to British punk with a definitive Perth twist mixes old and new alike as Rossko’s boisterous intent serves well, bickering throughout.
Although heavily in play in the local punk and DIY gig scene, Horders need not fear that Hordes are shattering genre of “heaviest metal festival in Scotland.” These guys are heavy, they are rock n roll, and they will wreck your necks!
WREAKING JOY (SATURDAY)
Proudly part of Dundee JCHC zine, Posi Hardcore / Powerviolence youngsters Wreaking Joy will be sure to liven up the pit with their quintessential east coast DIY tunes.
2022’s simply titled Demo is a three-track, five-minute snapshot on what we can expect. Jazz Funk Great no. 13 cleverly eludes to a bare minute of bouncy instrumental funk before agonised screams callously conclude. Title track Wreaking Joy paths a simplistic grunge rhythm opener, dropping beats before blooming into a heightened rasp, a fury and scurry from all members as if racing towards the finish line.
Feeling like the band have laterally warmed up, Ma Wee Mesocrictus Auratus (nominated cutest song-title of the festival!) clinches closing track leaving listeners hungry, yearning and very, very sweaty. Thankfully, at Hordes, they’ll have another twenty-five minutes of set!
HX24 Artists
CRUSADERS (SATURDAY)
“Debut single ‘V’ will be released across all platforms on the 27th September. It’s a song that has already become a recognised staple in the band’s set. With an aggressive, fast tempo, brutal attack, ‘V’ has already caught the ears of listeners at gigs!” – great news for Horders as Crusaders UK take to the stage on the 28th.
Glasgow’s four-piece thrash metallers Crusaders freshen up their 80’s counterparts, the likes of Exodus and Metallica with full on assault. The chorus may say otherwise, but V stands as the embodiment of this, pleasing crowds across the UK.
“V. The twenty second letter of the alphabet. The only letter in the English language that cannot be used to make a two lettered word. It stands for Victory. It stands for Veneration, but it also stands for Vengeance.”
Speed is of the essence for sure, not quite fitting for the imaginable Scrabble enthusiasts, and with lyrical style focusing on pop culture, films, stories and even video games, the sound is relatable, honest and daringly fun.
“The letter V has become synonymous with various pop culture references, one being the personification of the V mask. A mask that stands for freedom, anonymity and discord. The concept of remember the idea, not the man is prevalent here. The song stands as an example of the corruption of the current state, as well as how things may turn out to be. A thrash metal cry for injustice against how we live, and more dangerously, what may come.”
THULCANDRA (SATURDAY)
Napalm Records Thulcandra’s bring Hordes and extensive back catalogue, from their debut, Perishness Around Us (2004) to Hail the Abyss (2023), and hailing from Munich, they are another Scottish exclusive, aren’t we good to you?! This is sure to be a sing-along set with vocalist Steffen Kummerer (also of Obscura fame), to hold your hands as we journey into Germanys blackened metal underworld.
Primarily melodic black metal with inspiration from bands such as Dissection, Sacramentum, and Unanimated, recent years have stretched the band to venture a little further. Hail the Abyss combines tracks that are a little more speed and there’s more than a high five to death metal with impressive licks. Their fifth full-album attack sees Thulcandra prove why they’re keeping it black, yet quickly ascending death metal’s malefic vedette too!
Blood of Slaves is forceful, uber-brutal and compounds bass beats into the very depth of your soul whilst As I Walk Through The Gateway showcases “the band‘s affinity for dark, aggressive, and mellifluous metal”
Basically, if you like your metal like you like your coffee, (dark, bitter and quick!), then Thulcandra are the caffeine-infused injection you need to end things Saturday night.
HX24 Artists
THE INFERNAL SEA (FRIDAY)
“The Infernal Sea have been a plague on this Earth since late 2009, composing fierce and terrifying black metal from the Fenlands of England, conjuring compelling tales of English & European history throughout the Medieval period.” Job done. In all seriousness, if that doesn’t grab you then I don’t know what will!
The hardworking black metal merchants The Infernal Sea have timelessly proven themselves on the live circuit and now it’s time to see them cross the Tay to the Hordes awaiting. Previously supporting the mighty 1349, Akercocke, Anaal Nathrakh, Gaahls Wyrd, Mork, Napalm Death, Rotting Christ, Tsjuder and Vreid… to name just a few… The Infernal Sea holds strong as one of the UK’s formidable UKBM acts. Influences are drawn from the early creaks of Nordic black metal but what I like about The Infernal Sea is their engagement with the listener. A ghostly hand reaching out from the bleak moorlands, a commodious screech, smiting drums and sinister guitars, spindling through melodies like a shape-shifter in the night.
This year’s release, Hellfenic is sure to be shared on Friday night. “Hellfenlic focuses on the horrific murder and persecution of so-called Witches perpetrated by the Puritan Church in The Infernal Sea’s native East Anglia.” Something that genealogically resonates with this writer! “Twisted tales are told through the eyes of the famously barbaric and influential Witchfinder General, Matthew Hopkins.”
Nightmares are made of this watch at your own peril…
ANTE-INFERNO (FRIDAY)
Hailing from the wrong side of the Pennines, (yeah, yeah, only kidding!) this Lancastrian’s favoured North Yorkshire UKBM-ers Ante-Inferno bring the luring, darkened clouds with another Hordes Scottish exclusive. The highly anticipated third full-length album Death’s Soliloquy will be released 22 November 2024 via Vendetta Records and we’re hoping a sneak peek track or two might be on the setlist.
It’s been a couple of years since Antediluvian Dreamscapes, and it seems Ante-Inferno remain firmly amidst reconnoitering the darker side of the genre, describing Death’s Soliloquy as “…A work of death and a study of despair, or the audial and poetical manifestation of mental illness.”
Lyricist Kai Beanland explains, for him, that this is a “journey through depression and hopelessness, through obsessive thoughts of the most morbid and macabre nature—thoughts of self-destruction interwoven with the most appalling nightmares, broken hopes and unacted desires.”
Opening track, The Cavernous Blackness of Night harnesses the traditional black metal with majestic poignancy. Anguished vocals permeate through bestial guitars as the sound closes up around you, cocooned, but perhaps not nurtured. It’s a claustrophobic experience but not hostile, rather “An ode to madness, mental illness, death obsession and unfettered suicidal despair”
HX24 Artists
MUTALITH (SATURDAY)
Dundee’s very own Mutalith make their Hordes debut early on Saturday with their distinct blackenEd progressive metal. Released a few months back, The Eternal Dark is a three-track taster of the show ahead.
Demised, opens the The Eternal Dark and quickly degloves the coarse, grainy production as a notion that this a typical quick-release home-vault offering, but moreover a homage to black metal forefathers. Firm and gripping, murky and unwavering in style, second track Tears For The Deceased picks up the pace a little and we begin to hear Mutalith forewarn us of their inevitable growth in the scene. Closing track The End Is Near is plagued with progressive gothicism, expansive verse and scratching guitars that set the cochlear hair cells on end.
But that’s all she wrote, short but sweet, a small glimpse into the world of Mutalith. There are two reasons to see Mutalith – one to hear what else they have up their robed sleeves and two, to hear them before they break the underground.
HX24 Artists
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