Drain are doing it again! Like last year, they’re going on a massive headlining tour with so many other bands from the hardcore scene that it’s basically a mini festival. Terror and End It are on all dates, Scowl are on leg one and Angel Du$t are on leg two, and select shows are with Madball, Regulate, King Nine, Twitching Tongues, Mindforce, God’s Hate, H2O, Haywire, Trail of Lies, Mutually Assured Destruction, Cosmic Joke, Dead Heat, and Slugger. Wow! “The Good Good Tour is so insanely stacked that it looks like a fake fest generated by someone’s Spotify Wrapped haha,” Drain vocalist Sammy C ..read more

Toronto melodic hardcore band Mil-Spec released one of last year’s best punk albums with Marathon, and the band doesn’t tour very often, so it’s exciting that they’ll be hitting the road this year, with a Japan run in March followed by an East Coast US/Canada run in April. Even more exciting is that the US/Canada shows will be with the great California hardcore band Diztort and the fast-rising Florida hardcore band Collateral. Those dates include Brooklyn’s Saint Vitus on April 8 with local support from Dead Last and Top Dollar. Tickets are on sale now. Some venues on the tour are still TBA, b ..read more

The hardcore scene continues to reach new heights every year lately, and 2023 was no exception. From the melodic crossover bands to the heavy ass-beaters, from the promising young bands to the veterans that are still killing it, and everything in between, this was a killer year for hardcore of all stripes. There were so many great hardcore records released this year, and we’ve narrowed them down to our 20 favorites. Some caveats: we didn’t include metalcore (like Jesus Piece, Dying Wish, Year of the Knife, and END), but we have a separate metalcore list for that. Making a hardcore list means b ..read more

Dying Wish are one of the best hardcore/metalcore bands around, and their recently-released sophomore album Symptoms of Survival is one of the best new albums in that style. They’re already the kind of band that you can picture young bands looking up to one day (if they aren’t already), and if you’re wondering what bands they looked up to, you’re in luck. Vocalist Emma Boster has made us a list of her 10 favorite hardcore albums of all time, which range from Hatebreed to Foundation to No Warning, with commentary on each pick. Read on to see what she had to say, and see upcoming Dying Wish tour ..read more

Axe To Grind is one of the best and the most consistent hardcore podcasts out there. Every week without fail (and even more if you sign up for their Patreon), they release a new 60+ minute episode filled with hardcore knowledge, news, opinions, gossip, show reports, and more. Hosts Tom Sheehan (of Indecision & Most Precious Blood), industry vet Bob Shedd (ex-Revelation Records, Sound and Fury co-founder), and Patrick Kindlon (of Drug Church and Self Defense Family) are all hardcore lifers with years of experience and current knowledge that they bring to the table on each episode, switching ..read more

With fall approaching, we’ve been looking back on some of the albums we love that came out during spring and summer of 2023. Yesterday we looked at 10 post-hardcore & emo albums that came out during the year’s warmer months, and today we’re looking at something a little more aggressive: 10 hardcore albums from that same time period. We don’t want to get into a subgenre debate, but if you’re looking for the new Scowl, Militarie Gun, Fiddlehead, and Angel Du$t, we included those in the post-hardcore list, and this list focuses a little more on bands who haven’t (yet?) crossed over (but we ar ..read more

Norman Brannon of Texas Is The Reason, New End Original, Shelter, and more (and currently touring guitarist for Thursday) recently relanched his legendary ’90s hardcore fanzine Anti-Matter as a Substack, and we invited him on the BrooklynVegan podcast to talk more about the relaunch, and why it made sense to bring it back today. The conversation took all kinds of interesting twists and turns, and I think if you’re into any type of hardcore then and/or now, it’s very worth listening to what Norman had to say. Listen on Spotify, Apple, Google, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Here are some ex ..read more

Anthony “Civ” Civarelli, vocalist of Gorilla Biscuits and his own eponymous band CIV, is releasing a book about his time as a roadie for Youth of Today on their 1987 Break Down the Walls tour. It’s called A Roadie’s Tale, and it’s due in September via Tribal Books (pre-order). The synopsis reads: In the summer of 1987, a hardcore kid from Queens, New York, set out on a summer adventure that would forever change the course of his life. Anthony Civorelli (better known as Civ) accompanied by six friends, headed west to play music and try to change the world. This book is based on his daily journ ..read more

LA hardcore festival Sound and Fury went down in Exposition Park this past weekend (July 29 & 30), and judging by videos we’ve seen, the fest drew huge crowds and had tons of highlights and surprises. Among them: Ceremony did a surprise set entirely made up of songs from their 2006 powerviolence debut LP Violence Violence, including all the songs that also make up 2005’s Ruined EP, some of which hadn’t been played live in a while. Trapped Under Ice played on day two, with longtime drummer (and Turnstile vocalist) Brendan Yates back on drums, and Turnstile bassist Franz Lyons made a guest v ..read more

Norman with Thursday at Riot Fest by James Richards IV Norman Brannon has relaunched his classic fanzine Anti-Matter as a Substack for its 30th anniversary. If you’re unfamiliar with Anti-Matter or Norman, here’s a refresher: Anti-Matter was a fanzine that existed between 1993-1995, a compilation album released in 1996, a Punk Planet column that ran from 1997-1999, and an anthology book published in 2007. Anti-Matter is the new online home for contemplation and hardcore conversation from the desk of Norman Brannon—perhaps even better known for having played guitar in bands like Texas is the R ..read more