CELESTIAL SANCTUARY / CRUELTY
NEW CROSS INN, LONDON
South London’s New Cross Inn is its own, unruly ecosystem, regularly hostferal diatribes. Their blackened apocalyptic hardcore sounds like they’ve taken to the streets in the aftermath of a city-consuming fireball. Cambridge’s add grandeur to the savagery, finding a sick spot between abyssal old-school death metal and the scene’s new breed, replacing occult vibes with cutthroat sweep-picking and modern technical nous. It’s a potent, mountainpummelling brew, uniting headbangers and moshpitters alike. Massachusetts’ ignite new levels of chaos, punters flying across the room like those cartoon fight-clouds with limbs, ampersands and hash marks sticking out. Their corroded chug offers an anchor of dread, but it’s bristling with Mark Whelan’s charred vocals and panicked, luminous riffs like a star being kicked into going supernova. They course between doomy trawls and epic conflagrations, and the oddly Linkin Park-esque chorus on offers one brief moment of anthemic relief.