top of page

LIVE FROM THE PIT: Reality Unfolds - DAY TWO

Jake Longhurst

Day two at Reality Unfolds was, in many ways, very similar to day one. It was full of amazing bands playing brilliant sets, there were loads of breakdowns and filthy riffs, and my back STILL hurts. However, apart from that last one, there's a key difference - there were a ton more of them! With twelve bands on from 13:00 to 22:30, the day was jampacked with phenomenal musical ability from start to end and barely gave us a minute to breathe before we staggered out into the cold night air to get some rest. Each band also played with a Palestinian flag behind them, which was made more potent and poignant given the fact that the ceasefire has just come into effect as of this morning, hopefully putting an end to some of the horrors the Palestinian people have endured.


We sadly missed both Supernova and Final Dose, due to bus issues and needing to eat respectively, but have heard that both bands played excellent sets! Please make sure to check them out as well as all the bands below whose sets we did manage to get to.


Blood Gutter
Blood Gutter

Our first act of the day was Blood Gutter, one of a few BN1 hardcore bands on who all had amazing support both from the crowd and each other. They played a death metal oriented brand of hardcore that was custom built for swinging fists and slamming into each other, and that - combined with their bruising energy - made them a great way to start off our day, shaking off the weariness of the day before. 'Friend Of Mine' was a particular highlight, getting everyone on their feet in seconds.


AKU
AKU

Straight afterwards came AKU, another one of the BN1 crew, who spat out a multitude of rough-n-ready hardcore punk songs for the excited audience. With a singer dressed like a punk Freddie Mercury and a barrelful of piss and vinegar at the ready, they put on a great show early in the day. Finishing with their song 'In Automatic', the audience bought in hard and got on, across, and off the stage plenty - far more than you'd usually see at two o'clock in the afternoon on a Saturday in January!


Supera Morza
Supera Morza

Manchester's Supera Morza played the most punk-driven set of the weekend thus far, full of riffs, yells, fuzz and fun. The crowd was a lot less mobile than the first few acts, partly due to the smaller impact of hardcore on the band's sound compared to everyone else who'd played, but that didn't stop Supera Morza from tearing through their set and showing themselves off brilliantly. For fans of old school grunge, Deftones, and pure punk, there's absolutely loads to love in this exciting four piece.


Vaticinal Rites
Vaticinal Rites

Mixing up the genres of the day, Vaticinal Rites brought some good old fashioned death metal along to Reality Unfolds. Last year's death metal moment came from Ancient Rivalry and they went down a treat, and Vaticinal Rites were no different. Drawing the crowd in using their 90's style death, with a pinch of black metal thrown in too, they had plenty of moshers pacing back and forth across the New Cross Inn floor (you may be noticing a trend, Saturday featured an awful lot of crowd movement). Playing a number of songs off of their 2024 debut album 'Cascading Memories of Immortality', there is plenty more in the tank for them hopefully!

Stranglehold
Stranglehold

Stranglehold played more hardcore to get us right back to where we'd been before Vaticinal Rites, and for a band who only released their first demo in late November they sounded phenomenal. Their set was fit to bursting with riffs, and had enough gruff yelling to do a remake of Full Metal Jacket with! The crowd clearly agreed, with plenty of people diving straight into the pit from the first note to the last. 'Fire Within' was a particularly great moment, with a deeply satisfying drum opener that then promptly led to yet more two-stepping and crowdkilling.


No Relief
No Relief

No Relief were the third of the BN1 bands on the day, and whilst all three of the Brighton bands were phenomenal, No Relief took the cake for crowd participation, garnering a truly crazy level of moshpit activity and stagediving that hadn't been touched up to that point in the festival, even by Friday's most hectic set from Dry Socket. The band are currently on tour with lineup mates Broken Vow, and are nearing the end of a long European and UK leg, but somehow still had more than enough energy to tear the New Cross Inn a new one and raise the bar on everyone else yet to play. There were stage divers left right and centre, spin kicks, crawlers, everything you've ever seen in a pit and then some - even Broken Vow joining them onstage - happened during this breathtaking No Relief show.


Malignant
Malignant

Malignant are a band from Athens, and their set was one of the most straight-up evil live shows that this writer has ever seen. The bar had been raised the set before, and they matched that and then some. Their vitriolic, pummelling metallic hardcore riled up the crowd into a baying frenzy of seething maniacs who, at moments, caused genuine fear. It was a momentous set that was truly mindboggling to watch, and showed off a band who's future is blindingly bright. 'Unrestrained' was one of the many unbelievable high points, and made for one of the best single song performances this weekend. They've said that they're hoping to return to the UK later this year for a full tour, and if they do we will be at the very front for every second of any shows we make it to!


Broken Vow
Broken Vow

One of the best, and most bittersweet, sets of the weekend thus far was Broken Vow's. The American's are on their last ever tour, joined by No Relief, and the show was their fifth last ever as a band, which was made even worse by the fact that they were just so damn good. Yet more energy poured from band to crowd and crowd to band, in a set that just kept giving us everything we wanted. The singer's Reading FC shirt was a bemusingly contrasting clothing choice compared to the vicious furore that they whipped up within the room, although it must be respected that he chose to wear it on a day that Reading lost 3-1 at home to the team one place above them in the table. I'm sure that won't be remembered anywhere near as much as how well Broken Vow played, marking yet another stellar performance on a day seemingly incapable of having anything but.


Bitterwood
Bitterwood

Glasgow's Bitterwood kept things fairly simple with their burly slam set, allowing the crowd to lower their IQ to single digits for most of their playing time. With 'bree's' aplenty, and riffs galore, the Scots swept the crowd away into yet more crowdkilling and two-stepping. It was slightly concerning when the frontman needed to leave the stage mid-song, about halfway through their set, and sadly this meant we didn't get to see their cover of the Beyblade theme song (all the more reason to see them again!), but when he returned he said it was "just a tactical chunder", and then proceeded to drop the back half of the set with as much excitable energy as before, and likely a happier stomach.


Ringworm
Ringworm

The final act of the day was truly something to behold. Headliners Ringworm haven't played in the UK for 16 years, so to see them finally walk onstage and rip through a collection of underground metallic hardcore classics was not only ludicrously enjoyable, but a real privilege. The audience were in absolute pandemonium, multiple times crawling up and over each other onto the stage and up the support pillar at the front just to be one of the twenty-odd people yelling into the microphone at any given moment. It might be best summed up by organiser Theo's baffled explanation of "What the FUCK just happened" as the band wrapped up their encore, with a grin plastered onto his face that likely will still be there as he reads this. Ringworm at the New Cross Inn was a set to be remembered, and will go down in Reality Unfolds history.


After such a bonkers day, we've got one last set of bands ahead who are sure to blow us away as well, so stay tuned to our socials for updates on the day, and of course for our final day review!


Words: Jake Longhurst

Photos: Lizzie Jones

Comments


Email: info@outofrage.net

Heavy Music Magazine

©2023 by OUT OF RAGE. Proudly created with Wix.com

bottom of page