Pierce Jordan’s guttural scream filled the halls of Philadelphia’s First Unitarian Church one night last October. He was surrounded on stage by other Black hardcore musicians plucking guitars, flailing their arms to the beat of the drums and diving into the crowd below. The air was heavy with body heat as attendees broke into a mosh pit and slammed into one another.
As the frontman of the hardcore band Soul Glo, Jordan is part of a growing movement of rockers who are bringing Black culture and aesthetics to the forefront of a scene that has long centered whiteness. The band occasionally raps over heavy guitar riffing, “because we like rap music, but it’s also because it’s part of [Black] tradition”, Jordan said.
