Despite grind having basically come from the punk scene, these days it seems the UK populace places it firmly in the 'metal' column. Add that to the fact we are already at the metallic end of the grind spectrum and you can understand why we rolled into the venue with some trepidation.
This was not helped by the locale being a soccer-friendly pub, complete with England flags and lager lout looking guys who were asking me why I had long hair within 15 mins of being in there. CRIPES! Also I was afraid to have my camera on view and stuff so there's nary a picture.
The Atomck members began to feel a bit more at home as the promoter and audience arrive- they are a bunch of crusty squat types (those are the types we like) and the bossman even had a 'afternoon gentlemen' patch so things were looking up.
First band on are We Fight Tigers who dole out upbeat and energetic HxCx sounds, whilst not this writer's cup they are tight and dynamic, and go down really well.
After this fine start it's our turn and still doubting anyone is going to care we begin.
All I can say is you shouldn't label people as this crowd go crazy, slamming each other into the ceiling and jumping about like possessed idiots. This is very encouraging and we get faster and faster, beyond what is particularly playable.
ICH play a kind of more melodic punk style, almost becoming a party crew in places. This begins to work wonders on the (now very drunk)
local football guys, who are coming ever closer to the gig crowd.
Fellow Cymru residents global parasite do a great job of combining angry political attacks with fast-but-catchy songs. They chuck in loads of proper gang choruses and by this point the football guys are moshing out, shirts over their heads and hoisting amazed punk kids up into a meeting of cultures crowd surf.
After this carnage one of the locals confesses to me that when we walked in he thought "who are these fucking assholes" (which was, in all honesty, palpable) but now he's had so much fun he is going around apologising to everyone, and that he never knew how good "rock music" could be.
Considerable win then.
This night we drive onto London and stay at our pal Tim's place (which I do have a photo of) meaning we have access to stuff like showers and carpets and internet.
ABOVE: Tim's house, made only slightly messier by our presence :)
In the balance this was a superb night, not only did we leave the venue unstabbed by hooligans, but the crowd were genuinely responsive and friendly.
The poster looked like this: (note, regimes pulled)
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