New England Metal & Hardcore Fest: Headbanger's Ball

The second annual New England Metal & Hardcore Festival, last weekend's two-day, 80-band blowout on three stages (two at the Palladium, one at the nearby Alley) in downtown Worcester, started with a whimper and ended with a bang. And between Friday night's new-metal false start with Machine Head and Reveille and the finale, with the Misfits leaving the stage just before 2 a.m. on Sunday, there was hardly a dull moment.

"I've never seen so many ugly people in one place in my life," quipped Simon Brody, vocalist for Vermont heavies Drowningman, on Saturday, and the legions of angry white males who filled the eventually sold-out Palladium made for an increasingly ugly atmosphere as the fest dragged on. Amenities were somewhat lacking: getting something to eat other than sausages from the sidewalk vendor meant taking a long walk in the cold, seating was scarce, and (horror of horrors) the entire festival ran out of cheap whiskey by 2 p.m. on Saturday. Conditions in the men's room near the main stage were grislier than Cannibal Corpse's lyrics.

But metal and hardcore sound better on frayed nerves anyway, and as the conditions deteriorated, the music only seemed to improve. There were countless variations on the "loud fast rules" formula at the festival, with death metal the most well represented and (surprisingly enough, given that it peaked artistically at least 10 years ago) well executed. Cannibal Corpse were the biggest death-metal band on the bill and among the most entertaining groups all weekend -- people sang along to the band's garbled standards "I Cum Blood" and "Fucked with a Knife" as if they were radio favorites. Six Feet Under -- although fronted by the genre's most distinctive growler, original Cannibal Corpse singer Chris Barnes -- were actually outdone by lesser-known acolytes Dying Fetus and God Dethroned, both of whom brought new wrinkles to their Slayer-derived tempo changes and dueling guitar leads.

The hardcore bands shunned all the growling and guitar soloing of the death-metal acts, but they provided the best soundtrack for another festival constant: the mosh pit. Drunken metalheads and hormone-crazed hardcore kids weren't always picky about what they danced to, but the choreographed dance sections of songs by hardcore standouts like Boston's Reach the Sky had the pits working overtime. Snapcase, the most notable hardcore band on the bill, managed to generate a huge pit in addition to (or maybe in spite of) clever guitar atmospherics, which punctuated their songs.

The fest wasn't all about the underground, though, especially not on Friday night. Drew Simollardes, singer of central Massachusetts homeboys Reveille, made sure the hordes of kids who came to see him got their money's worth when he climbed on top of a speaker and jumped 10 feet into the crowd during "Take a Look Around," the band's hi-hat-splashing radio hit. New-metal forefathers Machine Head tried out all kinds of fancy Radiohead guitar parts, but weren't nearly as successful at it as Snapcase. Both bands, it should be noted, are strong proponents of what's quickly becoming the mullet of the new generation -- the floppy, dog-eared Korn braids that covered the head of practically every teenage boy in attendance on Friday night.

Along with the usual cache of established veterans (whom I missed due to scheduling conflicts) -- Dillinger Escape Plan, Buried Alive, Shadows Fall, etc. -- the fest had its share of wild cards. On Saturday, Revelation labelmates Drowningman and Himsa played strong sets of emo-tinged math-metal in place of missing Boston mainstays Cave In and Converge, while North Carolina's Spite rocked an unjustly small crowd of 20 at the Alley with their Southern-fried Jesus Lizard metal. Boston noisemongers Isis, who held the proud distinction of being the slowest band on the bill, played a hypnotic set of new material on the Palladium's second stage later that night.

And that's when the shit hit the fan. Connecticut hardcore toughs Hatebreed, originally slated to headline the Alley, were shuttled onto the second stage between Isis and the scheduled headliners, Boston grind-core fiends Anal Cunt. During a vicious set, Hatebreed singer Jamey Jasta challenged Anal Cunt to a fight, a challenge duly accepted by combative AC frontman Seth Putnam as soon as Hatebreed stopped playing. The fight spilled out onto the sidewalk, the cops came, and -- needless to say -- Anal Cunt did not perform.

Oblivious to the trouble outside, main-stage headliners the Misfits busted through a mostly undistinguished set highlighted by the classic "Last Caress" and "Saturday Night," a brilliant rewrite of "Unchained Melody" taken from their latest album, Famous Monsters (Roadrunner). When they finished playing, there were no more signs of the fight, just long lines of exhausted, satisfied metalheads taking their earplugs out and heading for the door.

-- Sean Richardson