If you’re a hardcore fan, the 2020s have already been something of a vintage decade. Save for a Madball here or a Hatebreed there, the genre had never really made any serious inroads into major mainstream acceptance previously, but there are now a handful of bands that look like they could change that. One of them is Kentucky quintet Knocked Loose, who this evening have managed the impressive feat of selling out London’s 2,500-capacity Forum.
Before they join us, French hardcore crew Headbussa get necks and fists in the pit limbered up with some savage beatdown terror, and San Francisco blackgaze trailblazers Deafheaven play a set mostly comprised of their most extreme material. Eschewing the more melodic and dreamy numbers from 2021’s Infinite Granite, they instead focus on blasting the shit out of everyone with tracks such as Gifts for the Earth from their more metallic 2015 album New Bermuda, with frontman George Clarke a captivating focal point as he lifts his skinny fists to heaven. You could argue that Deafheaven’s soaring, white-hot majesty is a slightly odd fit alongside the gruff, brute force of what they are sandwiched in between, but the chant that goes up as the final chords of Dream House ring out prove that the pairing certainly worked.
