Live Review: Nasty + support @ Levontin 7, Tel Aviv [25th May 2017]

Nasty
03
Ostra Torn

There are some bands that I thought might never come to this country and when they actually do, it's not something to miss out. Tonight, a variety of people from the different hardcore scenes in Tel Aviv have gathered at Levontin 7 to witness the crazily heavy beatdowns of Belgian hardcore crew Nasty.

Östra Torn

Starting off tonight's proceedings is Haifa trio, Östra Torn. I've already reviewed these guys recently when they supported Zaga Zaga and I was really impressed by their doomy/sludgy hardcore. They did a very similar set tonight, set up in a triangle and just making the loudest noise possible. The band walks the fine line of playing loose enough that the music feels more natural and free-flowing but tight enough that no-one is loosing their place and they're all on the same page. The band hasn't got anything recorded yet (soon to come, though, I believe..) but watching them live is essential. You find yourself in some sort of tennis-spectator mode, as your eyes bounce from screaming bassist Nir to more growly guitarist Dean while drummer Ofer goes crazy amidst the heavy riffs and rumbling bass. I think that even when they do eventually release something, this is a band that can also be solely enjoyed live without needing to be familiar with the material. As long as you like things slow, heavy and energetic, you'll be smiling the whole show.

4/5

03

It was quite disappointing to hear shortly beforehand that tonight is 03's (Efes Shalosh) last show, so I think there's a lot of people who have come almost exclusively in support of them. Like Östra Torn, I have reviewed 03 before but with varying reviews. They've definitely become the tough hardcore powerhouse that they are now since the addition of guitarist Lemmy, who always jumps about the stage like his guitar's a kid's toy! With the recent release of their first album This Is Survival, Not A Revival, more people have gotten to hear exactly what this band does and have therefore gained more recognition. I still wouldn't go as far as saying that they're breaking any new ground in hardcore but they've certainly helped bridge that gap between hardcore and metalcore in this country, even bringing both fanbases to their shows.

As always, singer Jenia struts about the stage and the venue floor with his razor blade vocals blasting out of the speakers while the band delivers their Born From Pain meets Madball hardcore with infectious energy that rubs off on the crowd. The track Bruce Lee will forever be the band's Clobberin' Time; like the Sick Of It All song, it's less than a minute's worth of thunderous instrumental hardcore that just gets everyone pumped, making it the highlight of every show. They definitely have the right grooves to get people moving and a general likability but it just always feels like they're lacking something that separates them from the rest of the hardcore world.

 Hopefully, the band are not splitting up completely but just taking a break for a while and will come back with some fresh new material.

3.5/5

Nasty

All these years, I've wondered what kind of people would turn up to see some proper European beatdown hardcore. Tonight, there's a bunch of faces I've never really seen before as well as a few familiar ones. I was still unsure by what the reaction would be as normally any form of hardcore show out here tends to be still pretty "punk" in terms of the dancing and the general attitude. Although 03's set saw a bit of "violence", things went up a notch for Belgian posse Nasty.


Pretty much from the start, the pit has opened up and we see some 2-stepping, spin kicks, windmilling and stage diving as Nasty plough through their low-tuned, boisterous, hip-hop tinged hardcore. Frontman, Matthi, roams about the stage, getting everyone fired up and encouraging all the pit-action. The rest of the band also give it their all on stage, with Paddy (guitar) and Berri (bass) bouncing around and Nash smashing the kit behind them.

To be honest, the rest of the show becomes a bit of a blur as it just gets so crazy (and a literal blur because I took my glasses off to avoid any mishaps). As the band plays hits like Shokka, Lying When They Love Us and Slave To The Rich, bodies start flying all over the place, knocking the monitors off the stands in front of the stage. This leads to Matthi deciding to move all the monitors to the side of the stage and leave the front completely free for stag diving and sing-a-longs.

Whereas you can sometimes come across bands who are in the mindset of just turning up, plugging in and playing, it seems as though Nasty are genuinely excited to be experiencing a show in Tel Aviv, making sure that everyone's having a good time and especially that there's some carnage. There's very minimal talking between songs and nothing gets too "preachy". Even when it gets to the finale of anti-fascist anthem Zero Tolerance, Matthi mostly spreads some PMA instead of getting political.

This has to be one of the most "hardcore" shows I've ever been to in Israel, in terms of seeing some of the dancing I grew up seeing in the London scene. Maybe it's because of my age but I actually felt too intimidated to join in as much as I would have liked to. That said, it was still cool to just watch from the sidelines. Where I once originally thought of Nasty in a similar way as a band like Emmure (i.e. immature heavy music for college jocks), my views have changed. Nasty are simply a tough hardcore band with some solid beatdowns and try to touch upon serious topics in the most aggressive yet also fun ways possible. 

4/5

All photos courtesy of Miguel St Labao

Live Review: TEDER FIGHT! @ Teder, Rishon LeZion [7th April 2016]

03 Ganza 

Eternal Struggle

Petrichor

 Up until now, the only main reason I ever had to venture down to Rishon LeZion (a city just a little south of Tel Aviv) was for a teaching job I was doing. I haven't had to go back there in quite some months. Tonight, I find myself in a section of the city I've never been to before, on the edge of a cross section next to pretty much nothing else except this skate park/youth centre/music venue called Teder. I have come here to finally support Eternal Struggle and 03 (Efesh Shalosh), as well as finally check out Petrichor and Ganza, who have all come to play in front of a crowd of, what looks like, mostly 15 year olds.

Petrichor

Photo by ANON

 I've already checked out a bit of Petrichor beforehand via some of their music videos. From what I gathered, it was basically a kind of metalcore/easycore with clean vocals. Tonight, there is that but also with more of a hint of hard rock simpleness.
 I managed to just come in during opener One Of A Kind, which is jumpy and fun enough but a bit weak lyrically. It's fine for the very young crowd that's here tonight but doesn't quite resonate for me. This goes for most of the band's material. The musical style of hard rock meets fairly watered down metalcore mixed together with the lyrics just brings to mind something you might see on a coming-of-age tv show. It borders upon the likes of softer Avenged Sevenfold and Atreyu.
  There's a hint of metallic riffing here and there, such as at the beginning of Take It Off and final song Hate Me, which generally brought to mind both Alice Cooper's 18 and Nirvana's Rape Me due to its chorus. A circle pit breaks out for Desperate Call, despite it not really being heavy or fast enough to be worthy of a circle pit. But that's just the kind of crowd we have tonight; kids desperate to get their frustrations out. I remember those days...
 The band themselves are talented musicians. Frontman, Gal, manages to hold some fairly good notes but it's bassist, Yuval, who is the most impressive. Not only is he solid throughout, but he even manages to slip in some cool bass solos, like on Paranoid (not the Sabbath song). Whether the band will make it in Europe and the States, I'm not entirely sure. The sound and songwriting needs to mature a tad more but in the meantime, I think both the very young and more old school fans of rock and hair metal will dig them.

2.5/5

Eternal Struggle

  I have only managed to see Eternal Struggle once before. Technically twice, but I don't really count their awful sounding support slot for Biohazard. They may have had some of the same material and band members, but i just don't remember even sounding near as good as they do now.
  Eternal Struggle basically play the sort of hardcore I grew up on. Very NY influenced groove hardcore, with some beatdown parts and gang vocals. Although there's a few bands out here that fall under the hardcore banner, Eternal Struggle currently fill the space that was previous left empty since maybe Instinct or You're Next!
 Although things did get a bit feistier during the song Lost, which more people are probably familiar due to the video, I feel that this kind of hardcore was lost on these more metal orientated youths. That said, I wasn't totally alone on the spin kicking and arm flailing front; I did spot a few others. I don't mean to say that you need to do all the kung fu in order to enjoy hardcore, but there was a fair bit of standing about and unsureness of what to do in the slower parts.
  Although the band's own material, such as Lost, Pride Kills and Repeat Nothing, hold up well on their own, it was nice to hear a Sick Of It All cover. Maybe not my favourite SOIA song, but Take The Night Off is more of one of their modern classics. They actually played this the very first time I saw them but it was almost unrecognisable for the most part. This time, however, it was a spot on. With a mixture of two step and bouncing parts, it did get some people moving, but judging by the fact that really only I and the 03 guys cheered when the band said Sick Of It All, it's safe to say that the crowd here were not all that familiar with the band or the song.
  When Eternal Struggle's album finally drops, I am hoping that it's interesting and fresh enough to get them some interest at least over in mainland Europe if not also the UK and USA. Those markets are hard to crack but it's not impossible.

4.5/5

Ganza

  Like Petrichor, Ganza is another band I was only partially familiar with beforehand. From what I could tell from the first few listens, is that it seems to be a more classic hard rock band compared to many of the other Israeli bands around at the moment. In actual fact, Ganza's live shows portray them as a band that hasn't quite discovered its own identity.

  From the outset, the band have a stage presence of a classic rock band who would have fit perfectly in clubs along Sunset Strip during the 80s with the likes of Motley Crue and Poison. As the band play on, the material is a bit of a mixture of genres, touching upon hard rock, grunge and metal. To be honest, I spent most of the set wondering if they were a covers band. As well as covering Alice In Chains' Would? in memory of Layne Staley and Pantera's A New Level...just because, I guess..., the rest of their repertoire sounds familiar and brings to mind other songs. The song Junkie has an Immigrant Song style riff and generally has a bit of a Living Colour feel about and All The Love has a riff which I was so sure I had heard before but I could not put my finger on it.
 When now Canine vocalist and temporary ex-Ganza vocalist Ben (Saada) joins the band on stage, everything takes a bit of an over theatrical turn. Deciding that he's now American and speaking to the crowd mostly in English, Saada manages to get the crowds attention before singing along in a pretty Axl Rose style manner. Again, there isn't much originality to the track. As great as the vocals and musicianship are, everything still has a sense of "college band" about it.  Frontman, Ari, acts like he's been in the business for decades. Having that sort of strong attitude can be considered both a good thing and a bad thing. Every performer should have confidence and bring a mindset of "this is going to be our biggest show ever" to a performance. That said, there is a fine line between confidence and arrogance and that line is often blurred during tonight's performance. The rest of the band seem to be pretty modest, but it could just be that he has such a strong stage presence that it was hard to really notice anyone else.

  Ganza may have some songs that can get a certain crowd singing along and interested, but in the general scheme of the type of bands that exist in this generation, Ganza don't quite seem to stand out or bring anything incredibly new to the table. Obviously, finding a unique sound is an incredibly difficult thing to do but it could just take some time and harder work to get the right ingredients.

2/5  

03 (Efes Shalosh)

Alongside Eternal Struggle, 03 are a new favourite of mine in the Israeli scene. Where I once thought of them as hardcore metal by numbers, their grooves and heavy riffs have taken a hold of me over time. Seeing as I did not make notes for them during the set, it's hard for me to recall their songs. However, the likes of No Racism and Something To Talk About, the band's currently only available track, gets people going. 

  They are great to watch. Guitarists Lemmy and Oren and bassist Misha spin and jump around while playing as vocalist Jenia runs about constantly as his harsh Born From Pain-like vocals jump out from the speakers. There is the odd metallic cliche, such as fist pumping and encouraging circle pits with the international finger twirling symbol, which don't settle with me too well but it seems to do the trick for the metalheads here tonight. 

  Being the end of the night, there is not as many people here as there was for the other bands. Those who are there include more of the band's closer friends, and the others are still the younger crowd who might not be used to his kind of hardcore. That said, their Hatebreed-like sound may have got them some new fans. 

  

I'm still eagerly awaiting 03's album to come out already. Not saying that their songs sound the same, but it would make it easier to hear the distinction between them on record than in a live setting. Especially as tonight's sound wasn't all that clear. 

4/5

Photos come courtesy of Miguel St Labao, Sharon Shapira and one anonymous photographer. 

Live Review: Hardcore Attack! @ Tachles Bar [Thursday 1st October 2015]

DUST

03 (Efes Shalosh)

Dam Al Zona

Sick Society

Tonight, I come to Tachles Bar in south Tel Aviv for a night of some of Israel's up and coming hardcore bands, including a band I haven't seen or even heard of before.

Sick Society

   First up is fairly new thrash influenced band, Sick Society. I've seen them at least a couple of times before but wasn't really into it. The last time that I remember was at the Zimmer and the whole set was a bit of a mess. Their drummer, Andrey, just wasn't on point; unable to keep tempo and sloppy fills which thus made everything sound very mediocre. By tonight's performance, the band has certainly done some hard work. Andrey's playing is tight, showcasing some impressive blast beats, and the sound over all is better than before.
 They might not be doing anything new but there are parts that make me nod my head and other parts that get a lot of the fans tonight going berserk. Songs like All Nazis Are Bastards and Black Penguin Society are more in the vein of simple street/crust punk, making them sound like many of the other Russian/Israeli bands out here. Other songs such as crowd favourite, The Slaughter, has a more crossover backbone and sounds especially impressive tonight.
  Guitarist, Johnny, plays some really old school style solos which, when he gets them perfect, fit really well and help them stand out a little bit more. Frontman, Alon, looking as thrash as possible, might not have anything unique about his vocal style or presence, but he loves the music and he loves the crowd. He shows that by crowd surfing, managing to return to the stage just in time to continue the song. He also brought a bit of fun to the party at the very beginning by wearing a Lucha Libre mask, but that quickly lost its charm, as it pretty much always does.
  My views on Sick Society have changed slightly and I definitely enjoyed them more tonight than before, they're just not interesting enough right now, although newer songs, The Dancing Monkey and "The Last Song", do show potential and progress.

3/5

Dam Al Zona

   Here's the band I'd never heard of before. Dam Al Zona (lit. Blood On A Whore), are a four piece from Tel Aviv who simply play some crazy shit. They look like they should be playing old school death metal but, instead, have that crust/early hardcore punk sound. The songs seem to be mostly in Hebrew, and due to live vocals for this sort of stuff being generally quite unclear, I couldn't tell you much about what they were talking about, but the songs are short, fast and chaotic.
  Frontman, Yuval, brings some hardcore punk ethos to the performance. He verges on the line of GG Allin, stripping off to his underwear, banging his head with the mic and even letting crowd members kick him and jump on him while he writhes about on the floor covered in (what I hope was) beer. Sometimes, the time keeping on the whole wasn't also kept in check, but it was certainly an energetic live performance worth seeing.

3/5

03

   I've written a bit about 03 (Efes Shalosh) before. They're one of those bands that I've grown to like more and more over time. Especially since taking on guitarist Lemmy (Sintax), the whole stage performance and even the sound are somehow both much tougher. 
   Frontman Jenia has always been consistent. He has sung for both Instinct and Brutal Assault (maybe even others) and his vocal style hasn't changed. Luckily, 03 are musically more metal than the previous bands and thus doesn't just sound like a carbon copy of either one of them. He moves about the floor space, trying to get crowd members riled up and ready to move, which always helps in a performance.  

  No Racism is currently the band's stand out track, with cool grooves and some great "chugs" in the middle. They have more songs in their set than before and the newer ones sound even tougher. Comparisons to bands like Terror and Death Before Dishonour are obvious, although I'm eagerly awaiting the band's upcoming album to hear what else they have to offer. 

4/5

DUST

   Dust! How many frickin' times have I seen Dust now? I can't even count. Over the last few months, I've must have seen them at least once a week (I just didn't bother writing about it.) Yet another band who are meant to be releasing an album soon, these guys and their mix of unconventional stoner time signatures and hardcore aggression just gets me every time. They still practically do the same set over and over again, which, for a band who has to have been around now for at least 2 years already, you'd think would have expanded a little bit more. There are some new songs, but they're harder to get into. I'm ok with odd time signatures but when a song doesn't really settle into a groove, it's hard to follow and enjoy it. That's the feeling I get with some of the newer songs. That being said, I can't wait to hear the new album. 

4.5/5

All photos by Sharon Ronen

Live Review: Ron and Itamar's Birthday Party, Koro, Tel Aviv [14th November 2014]

Soon In Here

Malekhakhei HaPinkah

City Rats

03 (pro. Eh-fess Shah-losh)

Tonight is a celebration! Tonight is one of the most talked about birthday parties I've personally known of, and I feel quite honoured to be in some small way connected to one of the birthday boys. Ron Gilman has been living the last few years "in my endz", London, and has had success with London based hardcore bands The Blessed And The Cursed and, more recently, the short lived Crimes. Ron has returned home to see the family, as one does on a birthday, and also to see his old 09 (area code for Kfar Saba) crew. At the same time, he has opted to celebrate with putting on a show. I myself have attempted this on a much smaller scale but tonight is how it should be done. Ron has invited friends' bands to play, as well as reuniting with his old hardcore band Soon In Here.

03

Show openers 03 play tough hardcore. They do the kind of hardcore I like; hardcore that incorporates groove and that you could technically get your boogie on to. They tend to give off a similar vibe to 25 ta Life at times. Not that the vocals are anywhere as mental as Rick ta Life's vocals but they are that kind of hardcore and the vocals can at times be considered intelligible. Frontman Jenia previously sang in Israeli hardcore legends Instinct who I very much enjoyed the few times I managed to see them after moving here. This band has a more of a metalcore aura about it, which I did not really like the first few times I have seen them. Tonight, they open with an explosive intro which had this groove fan grinning like a nutter. They bust through their repertoire with aplomb. Both guitarist Lemmy and bassist Kaban (both also of Jerusalem based metal act Sintax) jumping about the stage, Jenia running amongst the crowd.... That's the kind of stuff I like to see. I feel like the band's sound has already developed within their short period of existence since their first few shows and I'm very interested to hear whatever they end up releasing.

3/5

City Rats

Up next are modern legends of Israeli punk, City Rats. Coming from the same school of thought as legendary punk bands such as Conflict, GBH and The Varukers, City Rats play angry street punk with that subtle old skool hardcore flavour. Every time I see City Rats, I like them more and more. Tonight they are on fire. Obviously, they've got their main fan base in today so everyone is going nuts to every song. Songs like Party Til Death and Pogo Beer Abu Kabir are just pure party punk anthems that you can't help but sing along with and run around to. I do not really know the guys in the band personally except for drummer Gutzy, currently also of fast pop punk band Not On Tour and hardcore dudes BEST. He is always a joy to watch play, as were the band as a whole tonight. 

3.5/5

I will also like to add, that as much as the band are pure crusty street punk a la late 70s England, they also remind me of Essex hardcore band Deathskulls, who mix street punk and straight up London HC to joyous results. 

Malekhakhei HaPinkah

Next up is Kfar Saba based Middle Eastern tinged rock band Malekhakhei HaPinkah. I am still unsure if there is even a real translation for that name. I have never seen this band before until now, nor do I recognise any of the guys in the band. Compared to the rest of the line-up, this band sticks out. They dress quite smart and just look...well...typically Israeli. As they kick off they're set, they definitely are a different tone to the rest of the night. The first song they do has a pure classic rock vibe and further into the set they play songs which incorporate Middle Eastern melodies and rhythms, such as songs like Lilot Abu Darbi (Abu Darbi Nights) and Sovev Olam (Spin World). They also delight us with 2 covers; MC5's Kick Out The Jams and ACDC's Jailbreak. The best thing about this set was that I was seeing people I know from punk shows and even metal shows dancing and singing along to practically Israeli rock. Up until this point, the night was just a hardcore/punk show. Now it was a PARTY!

4/5

Soon In Here

Finishing off the night, we get to pretty much the main focus of the evening. As much as Ron had been spoken of throughout the night, he now takes centre stage. Soon In Here are a Kfar Saba band considered one of Israel's best hardcore bands of the early 2000s. I had really only heard of them briefly so seeing them tonight in their last proper line-up was spectacular. Soon In Here only play a really short set tonight of their Screaming For Justice EP. They play hardcore with a similar vibe to some of Blood For Blood's later punkier stuff (mainly due to Ron's vocals), incorporating melodic hardcore riffing. Songs like Shout With Me and No Escape had long term fans and close friends of the band going mental with stage diving, crowd surfing and good old fashioned pogoing. From where I stood at the side of the stage, the whole view, both of the band and the crowd, was a joy to watch. This really felt like a legend's welcome; a proper reunion for a beloved band. I was even tempted to jump off the speakers myself. It's actually such a shame I am only discovering this band now and that geography hinders them from continuing and flourishing into something amazing. 
4/5i

There was also a cover band featuring Ron on vocals, members of Malekhakhei HaPinkah and other friends who did a set of 5 songs which was good fun but not really worth reviewing. I apparently totally missed another short reunion performance by a metal band called Bar Manin (Expired)...but all in all a good night was had by all.