Live Review : Cattle Decapitation + Shadow Of Intent + Revocation + Vulvodynia @ New Century Hall, Manchester on February 1st 2025

Absence may well make the heart grow fonder but so seemingly does constant interaction. Neither Cattle Decapitation nor Shadows of Intent are strangers to this country and even to this fayre city. It is the formers third visit in as many years, whilst the latter last graced us with their presence twenty-four months ago to almost the day. With neither being a scarcity in the touring market, it is impressive they have managed to pull a capacity crowd into a venue that signals an ambitious jump in size for both of them. This is Death Metal graduating out of the underground and into grown-up venues. New Century Hall may feel a world away from the grubby subterranean delights of say Rebellion, but it offers all four acts the opportunity to do their thing on a gargantuan stage, a challenge they all accept with vim and vigour.

Live Review : Vulvodynia + Pintglass + Auraboros @ Star and Garter, Manchester on July 6th 2022

Late opening doors, list confusion, a surplus of photographers and the distraction of a political meltdown happening down in Westminster, all mean that I only catch the dying seconds of Auraboros. What I do see is simultaneously chaotic and cathartic. They are a blur of kinetic energy, hurling fistfuls of distorted metalcore into the crowd. Very much one to put on my "need to arrive earlier" list.

Live Review : Fit For An Autopsy + Venom Prison + Vulvodynia + Justice For The Damned @ Rebellion, Manchester on June 2nd 2019

This tour is a true barometer of where the extreme end of heavy music find itself in 2019. You have four bands that share a love of Death Metal but present that central influence in four highly distinctive ways, you have four continents represented, you have a diverse crowd made up of a cross section of extreme music's many distinct tribes (with scissor-kicking hardcore kids and head nodding trad-metallers both out in force) and you have a pretty decent turnout for a Sunday night where every single act gets an appreciative pit and their lyrics screamed back at them. Overall this feels much more like a package tour of acts of a similar stature as opposed to a headliner and an undercard of also ran's, there only to make up numbers.