I went to a concert without even knowing a single song by the main act, but rather knowing more about the lesser known three opening acts. “Lesser known” is probably an understatement to whoever’s reading; they’re practically unknown to everyone outside of the listeners of the niche genre. “Knowing more” was also an understatement since I only gave one out of the four bands a true listen prior to this concert, but I knew of all the bands visiting. Every Time I Die had their 20th year anniversary and took bands Turnstile, Vein, and Angel Du$t along with them as a way to ‘showcase’ the up and coming within the new wave of hardcore punk, which I found pretty admirable. They booked The Ready Room down in The Grove for the performance, I was a bit annoyed about that since the parking there is horrible.
Fun fact, out of everything I’m bad at, planning out for concerts tends to be the worst. I insist on buying the ticket or informing friends about the show days before it happens, not even a weeks notice, every single time without fail.

The venue was compact, filled with tour posters of previous bands who visited the venue, it was charming. Not having my ticket because I don’t know how to plan, I bought it at the door and got my hands marked. My friend and I bolted to the merch bar first thing, and the thing was massive. There was at least three different shirt designs for each band on the wall in the back, all four bands had their own section of the table including things like their albums in various formats. As it just struck 7:30 p.m., just as we backed away from the merch Vein walked to the stage and started to make some feedback nose from their guitars as they made sure the mics were set up properly. A huge pit opened up as we made our way across to the left of the stage. There wasn’t enough space to be able to fit into the rest of the crowd, so we formed the mosh pit barrier. A deep bass riff became more and more audible as the rest of the members kicked off the first song of the concert. Arms, legs, shoes, fists all went flying from the barriers of the human wall. Tens of people in this club venue all thrashing with about three-fourths of their might in this tiny oval shaped pit. Energy was rushing through the entire venue for the next 30 minutes, non-stop action song after song, even during the transition periods between their songs were menacing enough to keep the crowd tense. They all stood there with their backs turned producing anxiety inducing feedback as they tuned their guitars for the next song. With each short intermission they had some computer generated voice lines ambiently rambling in the back to all of the feedback.
Angel Dust was the next band, and this is where the more annoying part of the event came along. Hardcore is known to have surprisingly short song lengths, usually lasting anywhere between some seconds short of a full minute, to about two and a half minutes. Each opening bands set lasted about give or take 30 minutes, which is short but still packs a punch. The problem is the mood killing intermission in between each band that performed that night. Almost each band that performed took about 30 minutes to re-mix the microphones for both hand and drum mics, re-tune their guitars, get the amplifiers set up properly, and replace the drum kit. Total energy killer, but they played some killer 80s hits where the whole crowd had a jolly time singing along to songs like “Shout” by Tears for Fears. The wait for the next band caused a ton of people to buy concessions, so my friend and I got to claim the front stage barrier spots. That spot was amazing for everything but my ears, by the time they came out and played the first note I could tell I would have serious ear damage for the next few days. I did, for at least a week.

The vocalist for Angel Dust was the most charismatic performer I’ve had the pleasure to witness, because he did not care what he was doing on stage and he it made look dope at the same time. He just had an aura of confidence that was just so contagious to just watch. He was doing all kinds of crazy things like falling back on his legs and air humping the microphone stand, doing push-ups during the breakdowns, jumping on the speakers. Every dance or movement he made just had a ton of swagger to it, you could tell he was just feeling the music. They put on an amazing show.
Not too soon after, the band Turnstile set up on stage and thank god that they set up quicker than the two bands before. The band had a really crazy energy that got the crowd going. I even got nailed in the back of the head by a stray foot of a crowd surfer, I shrugged it off though, you sign yourself up to get hit in these concerts. Turnstile’s newest album is definitely their best one, and everyone of them kept getting up close and personal with the crowd during the show. Finally, the main act was set out to come out after the three openers.
Every Time I Die had some cool stage lights that weren’t used throughout the concert that were just chilling on top of the amplifiers and the floor of the stage. What just caught me off guard as they walked up to the stage was their guitarist being bigger than the entire size of his guitar, the dude was intimidatingly buff. Stage lights went off, and the spotlights they had set up came on instead to give awesome backlighting making them appear as silhouettes. I could tell this is what everyone was waiting for from the guttural reaction from every fan as they came onto the stage. As they started playing, my friend decided to throw himself into the pit and disappeared for the longest time, getting lost in the sea of bodies thrashing against each other. I ended up talking to the bassist of Turnstile at the end of the show with my friend, I ended up buying a Vein record after the concert record due to the special clear design, but then stupidly decided to ask him to sign it forgetting I didn’t have any of their merch. He decided to go to the merch bar and get me a free record of their newest album and proceeded to sign it for me. That night made me lose hearing for multiple days, losing sleep because of the annoying ringing noise in my ears, but it was incredibly worth it.